"Oh, buck up, Sylvia! You're going to tell me every word about it, and more, once you start! I'll help you to start." He waited a moment and then said rather loudly and sternly, "What's wrong between you and Woodville?" Sylvia sat up, took her handkerchief from her eyes, and stared at him. "What? Have you guessed?" "Have I guessed! If I'm always as sharp as this I shall cut myself some day," said the schoolboy ironically. "Why, what do you take me for? Do I live here? Do I come down to breakfast? Aren't I and Woodville great friends? Have I guessed?" He sighed in despair at her denseness. "Dear boy, I'm sure I'd tell you anything. You're so wonderful and so clever, but how could I know you'd be so sweet about it? Why papa said even you wanted me to marry Mr. Ridokanaki. He quoted you." "Well, why shouldn't he? I do wish it." Sylvia's eyes blazed, and she tapped her foot on the carpet. "Oh, do you? Very well, I'm sure I don't mind! You see it doesn't matter in the very least what you think. After all you're only a little boy." Savile smiled with genuine amusement, patted her golden hair paternally, and said "Of course. But if I'd happened to suggest your going to the registry office with Woodville this afternoon (I believe there's one somewhere in Kensington, near the work-house), I suppose I'd have been what you call a _dear_ little boy, and you'd have let me have some jam for tea.... Poor girl! You must be bad." He laughed, and then said quietly, "Now, then, go ahead." "Well, Savile, it's too dreadful, and I _will_ confide in you. Last night"--Sylvia began talking very volubly--"that horrid old brute--you know, the Greek--asked Frank, Mr. Woodville, to dinner, and actually had the impertinence to offer him a sort of post in a bank, starting at £2000 a year, at Athens. ATHENS! Do you hear? It's in Greece." "Don't rub it in. This is no time for geography. What else?" "Well, it was on these conditions. Frank was to go for a year, and all that time the _fiend_ has given word of honour never to come and see me, or anything, and if at the end of the year Frank and I are still both the same, _he_ will give it up--about me, I mean--and get Frank the same sort of berth in London. And if we're not--just fancy making such a horrible proposition! At Willis's, too!" "Well, what's the matter with Willis's? Would it have been all right at the 'Cheshire Cheese'?" "What's the 'Cheshire Cheese'?" "Never mind," said Savile mysteriously. (He didn't know.) "And if you're _not_ still the same?" "Oh, _then_"--she began to cry again--"of course the wretch thinks there might be a chance for him. He _must_ be mad, mustn't he? But the horrible part is that Frank actually thinks of _going_! Fancy! How _degrading_! To accept a favour from my enemy! Isn't Ridokanaki exactly like Machiavelli?"