"Well," said Jack, very volubly, "if you’d said, ’There’s no occasion,’ or if you hadn’t said anything, our conversation would have been finished, you know." Marjolaine could have stamped with vexation. Of course she ought to have said nothing. And here she was entrapped into what this very bold young man described as a "conversation"! "The conversation is finished," she said, trying to pass him. But he held up his hand. "No. It’s my turn to ask you a question!" "_Hein?_" she cried, more than ever on her dignity. He had the impudence to accuse her of asking him a question! Jack remembered his manners. With a low bow he presented himself. "I ’m Jack Sayle, at your service. I ’m a lieutenant in the Navy; and I ’ve just rowed down from Richmond—three miles. I ’m home on leave; and I ’m looking for an old friend." "All that is very interesting," said Marjolaine, "but it is n’t a question," and once more she tried to get by. Jack felt rather injured. She might have shown a little more interest in the autobiography he had just favoured her with. "I thought it was polite to tell you who I was. As for the question: it ’s uncommon hot, and when I saw this terrace I said there ’d be sure to be one here. Is there?" "What?" cried Marjolaine, this time really stamping her foot. "An inn?" "Certainly not." "Can’t you tell me where there is one?" "I do not frequent them," answered she, freezingly. "No?" said Jack, crestfallen. "Sorry. I am dry. You see, I ’ve rowed all the way from Richmond. Five miles." Marjolaine had manoeuvred safely inside her own gate. She felt she could afford a parting shot at him. "I ’m afraid you ’ll have to row all the way back again. Good afternoon." By this time her hand grasped the handle of the door. Jack addressed the world in general. "Curious, how different everything is." Marjolaine turned. "Different what is?" "Why, if I ’d met an old gentleman outside his house in Spain, and he ’d seen how I was suffering, he ’d have said his house was mine." Marjolaine indignantly came down one step. "I am not an old gentleman; I haven’t any house in Spain; and it’s a shame to say I ’m inhospitable!" Jack’s face wore an inscrutable smile. He protested. "I didn’t. I only said it was different." Marjolaine came back to the gate. "Are you really suffering?" she asked. Jack turned away to hide an unmistakable grin. He spoke in a hollow voice. "Intolerably." Then he turned to her with a haggard countenance. "Look at my face!" Marjolaine came out of the gate. Ah, Marjolaine! The moth and the candle! "I can’t ask you in, because Maman and Nanette are out." Jack staggered to the seat under the elm, and sank on it like a man in the last stage of exhaustion. "It’s of no consequence. I must row back. Seven miles. Against the tide. Ah, well!" Marjolaine was genuinely sorry for him. He really was very good-looking. "I’m sure Maman would ask you in, if she were here."