“Well, there’s Herbert.” “He’s busy. Oh, you know where the kitchen is. Take it to the cook.” He disappeared slowly behind the tree. “What do you think of him?” she immediately asked. He murmured civilly. “Has he changed since he was a schoolboy?” “In a way.” “Do tell me all about him. Why won’t you?” She might have seen a flash of horror pass over Rickie’s face. The horror disappeared, for, thank God, he was now a man, whom civilization protects. But he and Gerald had met, as it were, behind the scenes, before our decorous drama opens, and there the elder boy had done things to him—absurd things, not worth chronicling separately. An apple-pie bed is nothing; pinches, kicks, boxed ears, twisted arms, pulled hair, ghosts at night, inky books, befouled photographs, amount to very little by themselves. But let them be united and continuous, and you have a hell that no grown-up devil can devise. Between Rickie and Gerald there lay a shadow that darkens life more often than we suppose. The bully and his victim never quite forget their first relations. They meet in clubs and country houses, and clap one another on the back; but in both the memory is green of a more strenuous day, when they were boys together. He tried to say, “He was the right kind of boy, and I was the wrong kind.” But Cambridge would not let him smooth the situation over by self-belittlement. If he had been the wrong kind of boy, Gerald had been a worse kind. He murmured, “We are different, very,” and Miss Pembroke, perhaps suspecting something, asked no more. But she kept to the subject of Mr. Dawes, humorously depreciating her lover and discussing him without reverence. Rickie laughed, but felt uncomfortable. When people were engaged, he felt that they should be outside criticism. Yet here he was criticizing. He could not help it. He was dragged in. “I hope his ankle is better.” “Never was bad. He’s always fussing over something.” “He plays next week in a match, I think Herbert says.” “I dare say he does.” “Shall we be going?” “Pray go if you like. I shall stop at home. I’ve had enough of cold feet.” It was all very colourless and odd. Gerald returned, saying, “I can’t stand your cook. What’s she want to ask me questions for? I can’t stand talking to servants. I say, ‘If I speak to you, well and good’—and it’s another thing besides if she were pretty.” “Well, I hope our ugly cook will have lunch ready in a minute,” said Agnes. “We’re frightfully unpunctual this morning, and I daren’t say anything, because it was the same yesterday, and if I complain again they might leave. Poor Rickie must be starved.” “Why, the Silts gave me all these sandwiches and I’ve never eaten them. They always stuff one.” “And you thought you’d better, eh?” said Mr. Dawes, “in case you weren’t stuffed here.” Miss Pembroke, who house-kept somewhat economically, looked annoyed.