“Land me in jail? Positively. I assure you, on my honor, you are the only living person who, by any stretch of the imagination, could offer damaging testimony against me, along that line.” He spoke so confidently she felt it was the truth. “I believe you,” she said. She wanted to say more, befitting the thrill of the moment, but she had no time. Dickie and two others were approaching. It might be best if he met them alone. So she slipped away and walked toward the house. It would be quite exciting enough afterward, she told herself, to find out what happened. It wasn’t until she got almost to the house, that she remembered she ought to have asked Bob for a ring. Of course, he would have a goodly supply of them. Would it make her _particeps criminis_ though, if she wore one of his rings? Then she concluded it wouldn’t, because she was innocent of intention. She didn’t know. She wondered, also, if she should announce her “engagement” right off, or wait a day or two. She decided to wait a day or two. But she told Miss Gwendoline Gerald what a lovely time she and Mr. Bennett had had together, fishing. And Miss Gerald smiled a cryptic smile. Meanwhile Bob had met Dan and Dickie and Clarence. CHAPTER XII—JUST ONE THING AFTER ANOTHER It was far from a pleasant meeting. Dickie looked about as amiable as a wind or thunder demon, in front of a Japanese temple. That oscillatory performance beneath the “kissing-oak,” as the noble tree was called, had been almost too much for Dickie. He seemed to have trouble in articulating. “You’re a nice one, aren’t you?” he managed at length to say, and his tones were like the splutter of a defective motor. “You ought to be given a leather medal.” “Could I help it?” said Bob wearily. And then because he was too much of a gentleman to vouchsafe information incriminating a lady: “Usual place! Customary thing! Blame it on the oak! Ha! ha!” This wasn’t evading the truth; it was simply facetiousness. Might as well meet this trio of dodging brigands with a smiling face! Dickie’s vocal motor failed to explode, even spasmodically; that reply seemed to have extinguished him. But the commodore awoke to vivacity. “Let us try to meet this situation calmly,” he said, red as a turkey-cock. “But let us walk as we talk,” taking Bob’s arm and leading that young man unresistingly down a path to the driveway to the village. “I shouldn’t by any chance want to encounter Mrs. Dan just yet,” he explained. “So if you don’t mind, we’ll get away from here, while I explain.” Bob didn’t mind. He saw no guile in the commodore’s manner or words. Nor did he observe how Clarence looked at Dickie. The twilight shadows were beginning to fall.