“Yes,” she continued, “you are simply ridiculous. Just as if you could ever be a lord. I don’t believe it! If six people died!” she concluded, with a laugh which made me feel what I was capable of. I could have killed her where she stood but for the consequences. If I held human life cheap I was still possessed of the caution of my race, and even at that age I loved her. Even at that age indeed! Looking back at my boyhood I am astonished at the insanity of passion of which I was capable. There is nothing more narrow than the scepticism with which older people treat the love-sickness of the young. Boys love even better perhaps than men ever can. Romeo was, I am convinced, not more than seventeen or eighteen—that is to say, as Shakespeare conceived him. I felt humiliated by her disbelief. I had been anxious to give myself some importance in her eyes, and instead she treated the whole thing with absolute derision. That day was to be in every way one of bitterness. She was standing at the schoolroom window drumming on the glass, when suddenly she gave a little shrill cry of surprise. “Oh what fun! Grahame is bringing someone in to tea, and father is with them.” I looked out and saw to my annoyance Lionel Holland accompanying Grahame and his father up the drive. What was the meaning of it? Surely Lionel Holland had not succeeded in winning Grahame to friendship! It was hardly likely. “And I do believe it’s that good-looking boy who won all the prizes at last year’s sports,” continued Sibella. “Yes, it is!” I had, even at the age of sixteen, a very genius for the analysis of character—although analysis is hardly the word. Characters have always had a way of displaying themselves before me at a bird’s-eye view. From the first I mistrusted the effect of a handsome and confident piece of physical splendour on a nature like Sibella’s. In the hall I could hear Lionel Holland apologising for his mudstained appearance, and Mr. Hallward’s breezy voice laughing away his scruples. “Nonsense, my boy, nonsense, I like to see it. It shows you have been enjoying yourself in a fine, manly way. Grahame, take your friend upstairs and let him wash his face and hands.” Mr. Hallward always took pleasure in the display of jovial hospitality. In reality he was a somewhat bad-tempered man, but when he was in the mood for a little display of amateur histrionics there was no one more genial or hearty. Sibella was flushed with excitement and I was inwardly fuming. “What is his name?” she demanded, turning to me as Lionel Holland’s voice died away upstairs. “Lionel Holland,” I answered, as cheerfully as I could, determined that, if possible, I would not betray my annoyance. “Do you like him?”