‘Ah, but I do trust you.... Why do you want to be so serious?’ He smiled faintly. ‘I notice that you keep all your seriousness for me, who am nevertheless supposed to be your chum.’ Graham looked doubtfully at him. ‘Tell me that everything is all right,’ he said, ‘and I will believe you.’ ‘Everything is all right.’ There was a silence. ‘Do you think you are keeping your promise?’ Brocklehurst asked, with a little laugh. ‘No; I suppose not.’ ‘What do you want to hear? What do you want me to tell you? It is foolish, isn’t it, to bother about what is horrid, when there is so much that isn’t?’ ‘In you, do you mean?’ ‘In me, if you like.’ Graham turned away while he tried to puzzle it out. Then once more facing his companion, he seemed to himself to risk everything in a single question: ‘Why were you sent home?’ Brocklehurst just perceptibly coloured. ‘You haven’t, you know, considering that you are my friend, a very overwhelming confidence in me.’ Graham looked down. ‘Yes, I have,’ he answered suddenly, impulsively. ‘You must forgive me. I am a pretty low kind of chap to have ever doubted you; but I’ll never do so again.’ ‘Not even if another fellow comes along and tells you things?’ ‘Never, so long as I live.... What a beast you must think me.’ Brocklehurst shook his head. ‘I only think that some one has been doing his best to turn you against me. I dare say it is natural enough.... You see, I used to get out at night――not very often, but now and again――and they didn’t understand.’ ‘Get out?’ ‘Yes; through one of the windows.... And because I didn’t take anybody into my confidence, they were sure I was up to no good.... I _had_ to go.... I can’t explain.’ ‘You mean, it _wasn’t_ to do any harm?’ ‘It was only to be out there――to breathe the air, to be under the sky.’ ‘But in the daytime――couldn’t you――――’ ‘No. I wanted to run in the moonlight; to run over the meadows; to bathe in the river; to be free.’ ‘But why didn’t you tell them――when you knew what they thought?’ ‘Oh, they are welcome to their thoughts. I’ve never in my life explained any of my actions, and I’m not going to begin now. Do you know――――?’ he hesitated. ‘Know what?’ ‘Only a strange fancy I used to have at such moments. It was rather queer’――he smiled shyly. ‘I used to feel just as if I had gone back to the life I had always been accustomed to――as if I had just awakened, if you can understand――while the other, my ordinary life, appeared to be a kind of dull dream, a kind of captivity which I should have to return to, but which, nevertheless, was not real.’ Graham watched him a moment in silence. ‘Suppose――suppose your fancy were the truth!’ ‘The truth! Oh, nonsense! How could it be?’ ‘Suppose you really did, long ago, live a life like that!’ ‘Among woods and meadows and streams?’ ‘Long ago, long ago――――’ Brocklehurst shook his head. ‘The grass was soft under your feet,’ Graham whispered dreamily, ‘and there was the humming of bees――――’