“Well, I should like to talk more about it; get a clearer idea of what was proposed.” “My father takes great pains in expressing himself. I should have said his explanation was as full as anything could well be on this earth.” “To speak frankly,” replied David, “I got the idea that you didn’t care much about your father’s scheme--in fact, that you disliked it. That’s what I wanted to be clear about. It would be ridiculous for me to be going round, delivering instructive lectures to you on antiquities and ruins and so forth, and you hating me all the while for a bore and a nuisance. It would place us both in a false position.” “And you can’t stand false positions, eh?” Mosscrop rose. “I’m afraid I can’t stand this one, at all events,” he answered, with dignified brevity. “Oh, you mustn’t think of going!” his hostess protested, with a momentary ring of animation in her voice. “My father’s liable to return any minute, and he’d be greatly put out to find he’d missed you.” “I could wait for him in the reception room downstairs,” he suggested, moodily--“or, for that matter, I don’t know that it’s very important that we should meet at all.” “I don’t call that a bit polite,” she commented. “I’m afraid your standards of politeness are beyond me,” he began, formally. Then the absurdity of the thing struck him, and he grinned in a reluctant fashion. “Do you really want me to stay?” he asked, with the spirit of banter in his tone. “Oh that depends,” she mocked back at him. “If you can be amusing, yes.” “Just how amusing must I be?” He propped into his chair again, and this time laid his hat aside. “Oh, say as much so as you were yesterday with the young lady of the butter-coloured hair. I think that would about fill the bill.” Mosscrop ground his teeth with swift annoyance. Then he chuckled in a mood of saturnine mirth. Finally he sighed, and dolefully shook his head. “Ah, yesterday!” he mourned, drawing a still deeper breath. “You were extremely entertaining, then,” pursued the other, ignoring his emotions. “Do you find yourself--as a usual thing, I mean--varying a good deal from day to day? I ask entirely from curiosity. I’ve never met anyone before in precisely your position.” “No, I should think not!” he assented, with gloomy emphasis. “I can well believe that my position is unique in the history of mankind. Such grotesque luck could scarcely repeat itself. But I beg your pardon--it isn’t a thing that would interest you; I had no business to mention it at all.” “It was I who mentioned it, I believe,” she corrected him calmly.