Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday he went to <i>The Immortal Hour</i>, and sat and wilted because she wasn’t there. Thursday morning he sent her the roses. Friday morning he got her letter, and spent several hours when he ought to have been working in assuring himself that this couldn’t go on, this being separated, this having to wait two more whole days and a half, and then perhaps call there only to find ossifications like the Fanshawes calling there too, and turgescences like Ned, and that callosity Stephen. At lunch-time on Friday he telephoned to her, and held his breath while he waited, for fear she should be out. No--there was her voice, her heavenly little coo. ‘Oh, my <i>darling</i>!’ he was within an ace of crying down the thing in his relief. Only just did he manage not to, and as it took him a moment to gulp the word back again she repeated with gentle inquiry--what a perfect telephone voice--‘Yes--who is it?’ ‘It’s me. Chris. Look here----’ ‘Who?’ ‘Chris. Oh, you know. You said you’d call me Chris. Christopher, then. Monckton. Look here, I wish you’d come and dine, will you? To-night? There’s an awfully jolly little restaurant--what? You can’t? Oh, but you <i>must</i>. Why can’t you? What? I can’t hear if you laugh. You’re not going to that thing <i>again</i>? Why, what nonsense. It’s becoming an obsession. We’ll go to it to-morrow night. Why didn’t you go last night? And the night before? No--I want to talk. No--we can’t talk there. No, we <i>must</i> talk. No it isn’t--not at all the same thing. I’ll come and fetch you at half-past seven. Yes but you <i>must</i>. I think I’d better be at your place at seven. You’ll be ready, won’t you? Yes I know--but that can wait till to-morrow night. All right then--seven. I say, it’s simply frightfully ador--nice of you. Hullo--hullo--are you there? They tried to cut us off. Look here--I’d better fetch you a little before seven--say a quarter to--because the place might be crowded. And I say, look here--hullo, hullo--don’t cut us off--oh, damn.’ The last words were addressed to deafness. He hung up the receiver, and snatching at his hat went off to the restaurant, an amusing one that specialised in Spanish dishes and might, he thought, interest her, to choose and secure his table. He then went out and bought some more of the roses she said were quite beautiful, and took them to the head waiter, who was all intelligence, and instructed him to keep them carefully apart in water till a quarter to seven, when they were to be put on his table. Then he went to Wyndham Place to see if Lewes, who was working at economics and sat indoors writing most of the day, would come out and play squash with him, for he couldn’t go back to his office as if it were a day like any other day, and exercise he must have,--violent exercise, or he felt he would burst.