But when Boyle turned and greeted him in an indifferent, half-friendly way, and then walked up and down with him on the platform, Arthur could not help feeling, in spite of himself, somewhat flattered and pleased. After all, Boyle knew most of the best people, and went everywhere. "I have an empty carriage; you might as well come in with me, if you are by yourself." Boyle seemed not unwilling, and soon appeared at Arthur's carriage. "I'm just on my way to Marcham," Arthur said, as if casually; "the Vallences', you know." There was a slight lisp in his pleasant musical voice. Boyle was putting his golf clubs in the rack, but turned round at this and glanced at Arthur oddly. However he said nothing, and after a moment he sat down, and, lighting a cigarette, began looking at the paper. As the train went out of Reading they began to talk, or rather Arthur talked. Soon he was discussing horses and actresses and gambling debts. It was a good game, baccarat, Arthur said, but you had to pay for it sometimes. He had just dropped a cool thousand or two, which was rather a bore. There was a music hall singer to whom Arthur referred more than once as "Mamie." "And how about Lulu, hey?" Boyle asked, with his disagreeable laugh. "Oh, Lulu--good old Lulu!" Arthur said, but he really had no idea of what Boyle meant. Boyle told a story in his short, indifferent way, and Arthur exclaimed, "Capital! capital!" and laughed loudly in the fashion of a popular man he knew. Had he ever been to the Vallences' before? Boyle asked. No, he had never gone before. Did Boyle know them?--Boyle had been there; was going there now, in fact, he said. "Really, are you going there now? How odd we should meet like this!" They talked a little about the place and people. It would be rather a lively set, wouldn't it? Arthur asked; and he boasted that his uncle, Lord Seabury, had warned him against them. But, good God! what did he care if people were amusing. "Do you know who else will be there?" "Oh, a lot of people. Mrs. Stair (Arthur blushed at this), and that young Glass." "Glass?" Arthur exclaimed; "oh, not really that man! They can't like him." "They like his money." "You don't mean they ask a man--a stupid boy like that--to get his money." "They don't say they do," and Boyle looked up from his paper with an expression that seemed to say, "You young fool, you don't know much." ("Is that what I'm asked for?" Arthur wondered for a second.) "I say, did you read about that young Hughes?" Boyle was saying. "It seems he's gone and played the fool--shot himself; wrote to his mamma he was ruined. So he won't be there." "Used he to go to Marcham?" "Oh, always there." "Well, it's the pace that kills," Arthur said sententiously, though his hand, as he lighted another cigarette, shook a little. "It isn't everyone that can stand the racket." "If they weren't all such sickening young fools," Boyle replied in a short contemptuous way, as if the talk bored him.