"What I meant was, did he recognise you?" "Recognise me? Why not? He called me Miss Oliphant and showed me his sketches. They're"--the eye I could see sparkled, taking in the whole bright terrace--"they're glorious!" "What about the bicycle?" "Glo--rious! He's a divine painter! Why, his books are like sawdust after his painting! I don't paint worth a rap myself, but oh, I know celestial stuff when I see it!" "What did he say about the bicycle?" "I didn't go there to talk about bicycles. I went there to see his glorious pictures and his glorious self!" "And incidentally to meet an apocryphal person at the Golf Club." "Pooh!" She took that in her stride. "But about those pictures----" "Leave the pictures for a moment. Why have you avoided me the whole afternoon until you came up a moment ago and said good morning?" "Surely you can guess that?" Again the fascination of the smile. "Guessing's lost some of its novelty for me lately." "Well, I wanted to dance with Jennie, you see." "I'm afraid I don't see." She looked at me quizzically, reflectively. "N--o. Perhaps it isn't as simple as I thought. But you were glad when I danced with Jennie, weren't you?" "I won't say glad. I was--very interested." "Why?" "You two--and him. That interested me enormously." "Well, now you've very nearly got it. That dance was our understanding, Jennie's and mine. We had it all out." "You didn't appear to be talking much." "I don't think we spoke three words, but we had it out for all that." "That's the kind of thing I give up." "Make an effort, George. You don't think I'd do anything unfair, do you? As long as there was a fair way left, I mean?" "I don't even know what you mean by fair." "Well, you're on her side, whether you know it or not. It took me exactly one tenth of a second to see that yesterday. You want him to get going straight ahead again and marry her. Don't you?" she challenged me with a brilliant look. "Never mind my answer for the present." "Well, you want that, and I want--something quite different." "Jennie doesn't even know that you know him." "What? How do you know what he's told her about me? Anyway, even if he hasn't, she knows I didn't fetch that bicycle for nothing. She smelt something in the wind, and now she knows perfectly well what it is." "From that dance? Wonderful dance!" "It's your sex that's wonderful. If you don't believe me, ask her." "I don't think it will be necessary. There's just one thing you've forgotten." "What's that?" "Him." "Oh, I've forgotten _him_!" she smiled, touching the reddened lips with her fingertips. "Him and what he may do. I think you'll find you've left that out of the account. We shall see.... So I take it you dodged me all the afternoon because we hadn't all been properly introduced to the new situation, so to speak? Is that it?" "Yes, that's quite good. There's no stealing advantages now. Everything's on the square, and what sort of a vermouth do they give you here?"