"Yes, and I promised that I wasn't going to tell."
"But that's so silly. Suppose now that I was really keen on her. For all you know, or I, for that matter, I may have seen her walking about the town and thought her jolly pretty without knowing who she was."
"And I'm damned certain you haven't. You told me that you didn't take any interest in girls."
"No, but really, honest, man, I may have seen her. Only this morning as I was going down to Fort's after breakfast I saw an absolutely ripping girl, and I believe it was me she smiled at. It's very likely her."
"Yes, yes, I dare say, but——"
"Oh, come on, do tell me, and I promise you I'll come and see her; honest, I will."
But at that moment the roll-bell issued its cracked summons.
"If you don't run like sin you'll be late for roll-call, and that'll finish everything," Roland said, and Brewster turned and sprinted across the courts.
Roland walked back to his study in a mood of deep self-satisfaction. He was carrying an extremely difficult job to a triumphant close. It did not occur to him that the rôle he filled was not a particularly noble one and that an unpleasantly worded label could be discovered for it. He was living in the days of unreflecting action. He did, or refrained from doing, the things he wanted to do, without a minute analysis of motive, but in accordance with a definite code of rules. He lived his life as he played cricket. There were rewards and there were penalties. If you hit across a straight long hop you ran a chance of being leg before, and if the ball hit your pad you went straight back to the pavilion. You played to win, but you played the game, provided that you played it according to the rules. It did not matter to Roland what the game was. And the affair of Betty and Brewster was a game that he was winning fairly and squarely.
Next morning he achieved victory. He met Brewster during break and presented his ultimatum.