She followed his glance. ‘Tubes and this,’ she said. ‘Yes, I know. They don’t match, do they. Perhaps,’ she went on, ‘I needn’t be so frightfully careful. But I’m rather scared just to begin with. I shall know better after the first year----’ ‘What first year?’ he asked, as she paused; but he wasn’t really listening, because she had put up her hands and taken off her hat, and for the first time he saw her without her being half extinguished. He gazed at her. She went on talking. He didn’t hear. She had dark hair, brushed off her forehead. It had tiny silver threads in it. He saw them. She was, as he had felt, as he had somehow known she was, older than himself,--but only a little; nothing to matter; just enough to make it proper that he should adore her, that his place should be at her feet. He gazed at her forehead,--so candid, with something dove-like about it, with something extraordinarily good, and reassuring, and infinitely kind, but with faint lines on it as though she were worried. And then her grey eyes, beautifully spaced, very light grey with long dark eyelashes, had a pathetic look in them of having been crying. He hadn’t noticed that before. At the theatre they had shone. He hoped she hadn’t been crying, and wasn’t worried, and that her laughing now wasn’t only being put on for him, for the visitor. She stopped short in what she had been saying, noticing that he wasn’t listening and was looking at her with extreme earnestness. Her expression changed to amusement. ‘Why do you look at me so solemnly?’ she asked. ‘Because I’m terribly afraid you’ve been crying.’ ‘Crying?’ she wondered. ‘What should I have been crying about?’ ‘I don’t know. How should I know? I don’t know anything.’ He leaned over and timidly touched her sleeve. He had to. He couldn’t help it. He hoped she hadn’t noticed. ‘Tell me some things,’ he said. ‘I have been telling you, and you didn’t listen,’ she said. ‘Because I was looking at you. You know, I’ve never seen you once in my life before without your hat.’ ‘Never once in your life before,’ she repeated smiling. ‘As if you had been seeing me since your cradle.’ ‘I’ve always known you,’ he said solemnly; and at this she rather quickly offered him some cake, which he ignored. ‘In my dreams,’ he went on, gazing at her with eyes which were, she was afraid, a little--well, not those of an ordinary caller. ‘Oh--dreams. My <i>dear</i> Mr. Monckton. Do,’ she said, waving intangiblenesses aside, ‘have some more tea.’ ‘You must call me Chris.’ ‘But why?’ ‘Because we’ve known each other always. Because we’re going to know each other always. Because I--because I----’ ‘Well but, you know, we haven’t,’ she interrupted--for who could tell what her impetuous new friend might be going to say next? ‘Not really. Not outside make-believe. Not beyond <i>The Immortal Hour</i>. Can you see the cigarettes anywhere? Yes--there they are. Over there on that table. Will you get them?’ He got up and fetched them.