“The point is, what did she tell _you_, Bickley?”
“Me? Oh, she was perfectly charming! It really was a pleasure to be refused by her, she puts one so thoroughly at one’s ease.” (Here, remembering Bastin and his story, I turned away my face to hide a smile.) “She said—what did she say exactly? Such a lot that it is difficult to remember. Oh! that she was not thinking of marriage. Also, that she had not yet recovered from some recent love affair which left her heart sore, since the time of her sleep did not count. Also, that her father would never consent, and that the mere idea of such a thing would excite his animosity against all of us.”
“Not quite. She added that she felt wonderfully flattered and extremely honoured by what I had been so good as to say to her. She hoped, however, that I should never repeat it or even allude to the matter again, as her dearest wish was to be able to look upon me as her most intimate friend to whom she could always come for sympathy and counsel.”
“Nothing, of course, except that I promised everything that she wished, and mean to stick to it, too. Naturally, I was very sore and upset, but I am getting over it, having always practised self-control.”
“Are you?” he asked suspiciously. “Then perhaps you have tried your luck, too?”
His face fell a little at this denial, and he answered:
“Well, it would have been scarcely decent if you had, seeing how lately you were married. But then, so was that artful Bastin. Perhaps you will get over it—recent marriage, I mean—as he has.” He hesitated a while, then went on: “Of course you will, old fellow; I know it, and, what is more, I seem to know that when your turn comes you will get a different answer. If so, it will keep her in the family as it were—and good luck to you. Only—”
“To be honest, Arbuthnot, I don’t think that there will be real good luck for any one of us over this woman—not in the ordinary sense, I mean. The whole business is too strange and superhuman. Is she quite a woman, and could she really marry a man as others do?”
“It is curious that you should talk like that,” I said uneasily. “I thought that you had made up your mind that the whole business was either illusion or trickery—I mean, the odd side of it.”