"Thank you," I said gratefully. I thought it was extremely nice of her to remember me. Probably I had spilt lemonade over her at a dance, and in some way the incident had fixed itself in her mind. We do these little things, you know, and think nothing of them at the moment, but all the time—
"Smooth," said a voice.
I looked up and found that a pair of opponents had mysteriously appeared, and that my partner was leading the way on to the court.
"I'll take the right-hand side, if you don't mind," she announced. "Oh, and what about apologizing?" she went on. "Shall we do it after every stroke, or at the end of each game, or when we say good-bye, or never? I get so tired of saying 'sorry.'"
"Oh, but we shan't want to apologize; I'm sure we're going to get on beautifully together."
"I suppose you've played a lot this summer?"
"No, not at all yet, but I'm feeling rather strong, and I've got a new racket. One way and another, I expect to play a very powerful game."
Our male opponent served. He had what I should call a nasty swift service. The first ball rose very suddenly and took my partner on the side of the head. ("Sorry," she apologized. "It's all right," I said magnanimously.) I returned the next into the net; the third clean bowled my partner; and off the last I was caught in the slips. (ONE, LOVE.)
"Will you serve?" said Miss—I wish I could remember her surname. Her Christian name was Hope or Charity or something like that; I know, when I heard it, I thought it was just as well. If I might call her Miss Hope for this once? Thank you.
"Will you serve?" said Miss Hope.