"And as I said it Consuelo struck a match--and the giant of a man filled the doorway! Striking the match was an obvious thing to do, for any one in the doorway had his back to the moonlight and was therefore indistinguishable to us--and besides the light of the match would help the moonlight to show him my excellent cigar-ash! But I was damned frightened--Tristram's face, in that sudden dim light, wasn't angry, his eyes weren't wild, but heavy, sullen. Oh, one can't express these things in words. He wasn't melodramatic, he was cold, too cold. His eyes were on me, not on her. "'Hallo, Tristram!' I just managed to say. And then, with a flash of absolute genius, Consuelo backed up with, 'But don't please ask him to join our happy party, for he looks so bad-tempered that he might spoil your cigar-ash just out of spite.' "And that _was_ genius at that crucial moment. It cut the ground from under Tristram's feet, he looked surprised--and he saw my cigar! The moment was passing. A long cigar-ash and even the shortest love-affair can't go together, even to the most suspicious mind--and Tristram, thank Heavens, had his moments of extraordinary simplicity. I raised my cigar. "'Oh, damn!' I said. The ash had at last revolted. "'There you are, I told you he'd spoil it!' Consuelo said quickly. "'I haven't even touched the thing!' Tristram protested--and we both really breathed for the first time since, two or three minutes before, we had heard the steps on the path.... "Well, that's all there is of it, the incident, and you must forgive me if I've taken a tiresome long time to get to it. Tristram, she, and I sat on in the summer house for an half-hour or so, talking rather constrainedly, but, anyway, peacefully. He showed that he had lost his trust in me, that he at last realised our friendship was over; his suspicions weren't more than allayed. But for the time being he simply hadn't anything to work on, for it wasn't so very unnatural that Consuelo, old friend as she was of mine, should sit by me in the summerhouse while I smoked my after-dinner cigar; and I wasn't going to give him another chance, because in that half-hour during which we sat on there I realised that Consuelo really wasn't for me, and that I was only making a fool of myself without advantage to anybody--and I decided with the last bit of strength I had left in me to do what I did the next morning, to run away. And, as I said, I didn't see her again for about ten years, and then very casually....