Clare felt herself start a little, and she waited a moment before she said anything in reply. She did not wish to betray any astonishment in her voice. Johnstone had asked the question under a sudden impulse; but a far wiser and more skilful man than himself could not have hit upon one better calculated to precipitate intimacy. Clare, on her side, was woman enough to know that she had a choice of answers, and to see that the answer she should choose must make a difference hereafter. At the same time, she had been surprised, and when she thought of it afterwards it seemed to her that the question itself had been an impertinent one, merely because it forced her to make an answer of some sort. She decided in favour of making everything as clear as possible. "Why?" she asked, without looking round. At all events she would throw the burden of an elucidation upon him. He was not afraid of taking it up. "It's this," he answered. "I've rather thrust my acquaintance upon you, and, if I stay here until my people come, I can't exactly change my seat and go and sit at the other end of the table, nor pretend to be busy all day, and never come out here and sit with you, after telling you repeatedly that I have nothing on earth to do. Can I?" "Why should you?" "Because Mrs. Bowring doesn't like me." Clare rose from her elbows and stood up, resting her hands upon the wall, but still looking down at the lights on the beach. "I assure you, you're quite mistaken," she answered, with quiet emphasis. "My mother thinks you're very nice." "Then why--" Johnstone checked himself, and crumbled little bits of mortar from the rough wall with his thumbs. "Why what?" "I don't know whether I know you well enough to ask the question, Miss Bowring." "Let's assume that you do--for the sake of argument," said Clare, with a short laugh, as she glanced at his face, dimly visible in the falling darkness. "Thanks awfully," he answered, but he did not laugh with her. "It isn't exactly an easy thing to say, is it? Only--I couldn't help noticing--I hope you'll forgive me, if you think I'm rude, won't you? I couldn't help noticing that your mother was most awfully afraid of leaving us alone for a minute, you know--as though she thought I were a suspicious character, don't you know? Something of that sort. So, of course, I thought she didn't like me. Do you see? Tremendously cheeky of me to talk in this way, isn't it?" "Do you know? It is, rather." Clare was more inclined to laugh than before, but she only smiled in the dark. "Well, it would be, of course, if I didn't happen to be so painfully respectable." "Painfully respectable! What an expression!" This time, Clare laughed aloud.