“Oh, very well,” replied Hood, “if you prefer his text to my exposition, he describes the same situation as follows: ‘I ought to be grateful, being perfectly happy after all this muddle; I suppose one ought to be careful about nomenclature; but it never even occurred to me that her nose would be out of joint. Rather funny to be talking about noses, isn’t it, for I suppose really it was her rival’s nose that figured most prominently. Think of having a rival with a nose like that to turn up at you! Talk about a spire pointing to the stars----’” “I think,” said Crane, interposing mildly, “that it would be better if you resumed your duties as official interpreter. What was it that you were going to say about the lady who brooded over misunderstandings?” “I was going to say,” replied the lawyer, “that when I first came upon that crowd in the village, and saw that tall figure and dark strong face dominating it in the old way, my mind went back to a score of things I remembered about her in the past. Though we have not met for ten years, I knew from the first glimpse of her face that she had been worrying, in a powerful secretive sort of way; worrying about something she didn’t understand and would not inquire about. I remember long ago, when she was an ordinary fox-hunting squire’s daughter and White was one of Sydney Smith’s wild curates, how she sulked for two months over a mistake about a post-card that could have been explained in two minutes. At least it could have been explained by anybody except White. But you will understand that if he tried to explain the post-card on another post-card, the results may not have been luminous, let alone radiant.” “But what has all this to do with noses?” inquired Pierce. “Don’t you understand yet?” asked Hood with a smile. “Don’t you know who was the rival with a long nose?” He paused a moment and then continued, “It occurred to me as soon as I had guessed at the nature of the nose which may certainly be called the main feature of the story. An elusive, flexible and insinuating nose, the serpent of their Eden. Well, they seem to have returned to their Eden now; and I have no doubt it will be all right; for it is when people are separated that these sort of secrets spring up between them. After all, it was a mystery to us and we cannot be surprised if it was a mystery to her.” “A good deal of this is still rather a mystery to me,” remarked Pierce, “though I admit it is getting a little clearer. You mean that the point that has just been cleared up is----” “The point about Snowdrop,” replied Hood. “We thought of a pony, and a monkey, and a baby, and a good many other things that Snowdrop might possibly be. But we never thought of the interpretation which was the first to occur to the lady.” There was a silence, and then Crane laughed in an internal fashion. “Well, I don’t blame her,” he said. “One could hardly expect a lady of any delicacy to deduce an elephant.”