"My name is Warrener," he said. "Oh yes," she murmured; "I'm so short-sighted----how d'ye do?" But he saw that she was twenty years away from knowing who he was. "This is tremendously nice of you," he exclaimed; "I was afraid you wouldn't remember me." "How absurd!" she said perfunctorily. "Why shouldn't I? We met at----?" "But so long ago. I _was_ afraid, really. I've been warning myself that you couldn't be expected to remember--and yet I knew I should be so pained if you forgot." She made a little amiable movement of her hands. He understood it to signify that his doubts had done injustice to them both. Inwardly he laughed. "Is your husband in Ostend, Mrs. Adaile?" "No," she said, "no, he's in the Tyrol--Innsbruck. I'm here with my sister and my brother-in-law. You know them, don't you?" "No, I've never had the pleasure. They weren't with you there." "Ah, no," she said, "no, they weren't.... Ostend is very dull this year, don't you think?" "I've found it very exciting; I saw you yesterday at dinner, and I've been trying to meet your eyes ever since." "Really?" said the lady. She allowed him to meet them, and looked away, her expression vacillating between a pucker and a smile. "My courage wasn't equal to risking a snub from you publicly, and you were never alone. You balked me last night, you escaped me this morning, and you drove me to desperation this afternoon. I ought to have known you wouldn't forget, but I always had misgivings, hadn't I?" "Had you?" she said. The pucker was getting the upper hand. She played with the postcard. "Confess!" said Conrad. "I remember you perfectly," she insisted with transparent hypocrisy, "but just for the moment I'm fogged where it was we met." "Will it help me if I mention Normandy?" "Normandy?" she echoed vaguely. "Rouen--the Hôtel Britannique--a boy who was called 'Con.'" "Con?" she cried. And the smile had things all its own way with her; for an instant the spirit of his youth flashed so close that he nearly captured it. "You are 'Con?'" "Still," he affirmed earnestly. "And you are still--Mrs. Adaile." "You are Con," she repeated, wondering, "that boy! And did you remember me directly you saw me last night?" "No--I've remembered you all the time." "Ah," she laughed reproval, "what a long while ago that makes it seem!--the boy never told me pretty falsehoods." "The boy never told you half the truth; he was a very backward boy." "If we are to be friends you mustn't run him down, Mr. Warrener," she said; "I was very fond of Con.... 'Rouen!' Have you ever been there since?" "No; I was abroad for years--out of Europe, I mean." "You were going to be an artist?" "I hoped to be." "Aren't you?" "No; I haven't the artist's temperament--I'm too constant." She regarded the postcard on the table again, and he did justice to her eyelashes.