"Private tutor?" he asked; and, partly to save further questions about her education, partly because she was not quite sure what a private tutor was, she answered in the affirmative. The stranger looked along the parapet inquisitively. "I'm out alone this afternoon," Sylvia said, quickly. The stranger asked her what amused her most, museums or theaters or listening to bands, and whether she preferred games or country walks. Sylvia would have liked to tell him that she preferred eating chestnuts to anything else on earth at that moment; but, being unwilling to create an impression of trying to snub such a benevolent person, she replied vaguely that she did not know what she liked best. Then because such an answer seemed to imply a lack of intelligence that she did not wish to impute to herself, she informed him that she liked looking at people, which was strictly true, for if she had not been eating chestnuts she would certainly have still been contemplating the traffic across the bridge. "I'll show you some interesting people, if you care to come with me," the stranger proposed. "Have you anything to do this afternoon?" Sylvia admitted that her time was unoccupied. "Come along, then," said the middle-aged gentleman, a little fussily, she thought, and forthwith he hailed a passing hansom. Sylvia had for a long time been ambitious to travel in a hansom. She had already eaten thirty-five chestnuts, only seven of which had been bad; she decided to accept the stranger's invitation. He asked her where she lived and promised to send her home by cab when the entertainment was over. Sylvia asked if it was a reception to which he was taking her. The middle-aged gentleman laughed, squeezed her hand, and said that it might be called a reception, adding, with a chuckle, "a very warm reception, in fact." Sylvia did not understand the joke, but laughed out of politeness. There followed an exchange of names, and Sylvia learnt that her new acquaintance was called Corydon. "You'll excuse me from offering you one of my cards," he said. "I haven't one with me this afternoon."