"You are not, I hope, expecting me or even poor Jones (Jones is me) to be so credulous as to believe a man sent them," said Barrett severely. When Maitland was in what Barrett called his "conquering hero mood" he did not resent these impertinences, at least not from Barrett. "If you are, I must remind you that there are limits as to what even little things like us can swallow." "Barrett, you are incorrigible. _Cherchez la femme_," said Maitland with evident gratification, counting spoonfuls of tea into the teapot. He often said he liked keeping in touch with the young life of the University. "One, two, three, and one for the pot. Just so! I don't set up to be a lady-killer, but--" "Oh! oh!" from Barrett. "I'm a confirmed old bachelor, a grumpy, surly recluse wedded to my pipe, but for all that I have eyes in my head. I know a pretty woman from a plain one, I hope, even though I don't personally want to "domesticate the recording angel."[2] [2] I thought the recording angel funny at the time until Barrett told me afterwards that it was cribbed from Rhoda Broughton. "She'll land you yet unless you look out," said Barrett with decision. "I foresee that I shall be supporting your faltering footsteps to the altar in a month's time. She'll want a month to get her clothes. Is the day fixed yet?" "What nonsense you talk. I never met such a sentimentalist as you, Barrett. I assure you I don't even know her name. But it has not been possible for me to help observing that a lady, a very exquisite young lady, has done me the honour to attend all my lectures, and to listen with the most rapt attention to my poor words. And last time, only yesterday, I noted the fact, ahem! that she wore a rose, a yellow rose, presumably plucked from the same tree as these." There were, I suppose, in our near vicinity, about a hundred and fifty yellow rose trees in bloom at that moment. Barrett must have known that. Nevertheless, he nodded his head and said gravely: "That proves it." On looking over these pages he affirms that this and not earlier was the precise moment when the devil entered into him, supplying, as he says, a long felt though unrealised want. "I seldom look at my audience when I am lecturing," continued Maitland. "I am too much engrossed with my subject. But I could not help noticing her absorbed attention, so different from that of most women. Why they come to lectures I don't know." "I think I have seen the person you mean," said Barrett, in a perfectly level voice. "I don't know who she is, but I saw her waiting under an archway after chapel last Sunday evening. I noticed her because of her extreme good looks. She was evidently watching for someone. When the congregation had all passed out she turned away." "I should have liked to thank her," said Maitland regretfully. "It seems so churlish, so boorish, not to say a word. You have no idea who she was?" "None," said Barrett.