One morning we were walking about on the pink tiles of the flat, uneven roof, not talking much, while below the sea slept. Lamoir asked after Hugh, just how he was, and I said he was quite well. “Lonely,” I added. We sat on the parapet of the roof, looking down the hill at the white untidy town. There was an American liner in the bay, like a smudge. At last Lamoir said: “Yes, he was always lonely. Lonely and proud. Hugh is very proud. Don’t you think so?” I said: “And you, Lamoir, aren’t you proud, too?” You see, I knew nothing of the difficulty between Hugh and Lamoir. All I knew was that two dear friends of mine had parted from each other nine years before. Lamoir was looking towards the sea, she was smiling. Then she shook her head suddenly. Her hair was quite grey, and short, and curly--you can see how attractive Lamoir was, an autumnal flower. “Oh, no!” she said. “_I’m_ not proud, not a bit. And I don’t like proud people.” “I do!” I said. She said gravely: “_You_ do, of course. But you are young, and it’s quite right that you should like proud people and should try to be proud yourself, though I should think your sense of humour would bother you a little while you were trying. I think young people should be proud, because if they are not they will put up with makeshifts and get dirty; but elderly people and old people should not be proud, because it prevents them from understanding anything.” “But elderly people,” I said, “don’t they get dirty too, if they’re not proud?” She laughed at me, and all she said was: “I was talking about nice elderly people.” And there the conversation ended, just nowhere. I think it very silly in a man to go generalising about women, but if I were to start generalising I might say that most abstract conversations between men end nowhere, but you have a feeling that at least something interesting has passed, while with a woman an abstract conversation ends nowhere and you have a feeling that she has only been talking about whatever it was just out of politeness. I remember that what struck me most about Lamoir at that time was how happy she was, happy and feeling safe in her happiness. That puzzled me then, for I knew she loved Hugh. II I would see a good deal of Hugh, sometimes going to stay with him at Langton Weaver, and often, in London, dining with him at his house in Charles Street, just he and I alone. It was very pleasant to know of a quiet house in which I might now and then pass an evening talking, as one always did with Hugh if one talked at all, of books and tapestries and fine things. I never knew a man who had such a passion for the touch of fine things as Hugh, and seeing him thoughtfully holding a little old ivory figure in his hand one might almost think his skin was in love with it.