“Ah, you,” said Mr. Spelvin, “have the soul to appreciate it. I could wish that there were more like you, Miss Packard. We singers have much to put up with in a crass and materialistic world. Only last week a man, a coarse editor, asked me what my sonnet, ‘Wine of Desire,’ _meant_.” He laughed indulgently. “I gave him answer, ’twas a sonnet, not a mining prospectus.” “It would have served him right,” said Jane, heatedly, “if you had pasted him one on the nose!” At this point a low whistle behind me attracted my attention, and I turned to perceive William Bates towering against the sky-line. “Hoy!” said William. I walked to where he stood, leaving Jane and Mr. Spelvin in earnest conversation with their heads close together. “I say,” said William, in a rumbling undertone, “who’s the bird with Jane?” “A man named Spelvin. He is visiting the Wyndhams. I suppose Mrs. Wyndham made them acquainted.” “Looks a bit of a Gawd-help-us,” said William critically. “He is going to walk round with you.” It was impossible for a man of William Bates’s temperament to start, but his face took on a look of faint concern. “Walk round with us?” “So Jane said.” “But look here,” said William. “I can’t possibly seize her and clasp her in my arms and do all that hot-breath stuff with this pie-faced exhibit hanging round on the out-skirts.” “No, I fear not.” “Postpone it, then, what?” said William, with unmistakable relief. “Well, as a matter of fact, it’s probably a good thing. There was a most extraordinarily fine steak-and-kidney pudding at lunch, and, between ourselves, I’m not feeling what you might call keyed up to anything in the nature of a romantic scene. Some other time, eh?” I looked at Jane and the Spelvin youth, and a nameless apprehension swept over me. There was something in their attitude which I found alarming. I was just about to whisper a warning to William not to treat this new arrival too lightly, when Jane caught sight of him and called him over and a moment later they set out on their round. I walked away pensively. This Spelvin’s advent, coming immediately on top of that book of desert love, was undeniably sinister. My heart sank for William, and I waited at the club-house to have a word with him, after his match. He came in two hours later, flushed and jubilant. “Played the game of my life!” he said. “We didn’t hole out all the putts, but, making allowance for everything, you can chalk me up an eighty-three. Not so bad, eh? You know the eighth hole? Well, I was a bit short with my drive, and found my ball lying badly for the brassie, so I took my driving-iron and with a nice easy swing let the pill have it so squarely on the seat of the pants that it flew--” “Where is Jane?” I interrupted. “Jane? Oh, the bloke Spelvin has taken her home.”