"She seems good at forgetting."
"What? Oh, yes, uncommon," agreed Babba rather absently; a pretty girl had chanced to pass by at the minute.
Irene was inclined to laugh. With all his eye for the situation Babba reduced it to absolutely nothing but a situation, a group, a tableau, a pose of figures at which you stopped to look for a moment and passed on, saying that it was very effective, that it carried such and such an impression, and would hold the house for this or that number of seconds. It was no use for life to ask Babba to take it with the tragic seriousness which Irene had at her disposal.
"I wonder if she'll have forgotten me," she said.
"She always remembers when she sees you again," Babba assured her.
"Ought that to be a comfort to me?"
"Well, it would be good enough for me," said Babba, and he began to hum a tune softly. "After a year, you know, it's something," he broke off to add.
"Have you really been away a year?"
"Every hour of it, without including the time I was seasick," said Babba with a retrospective shudder. "Ah, here she comes!" he went on, and explained the satisfaction which rang in his tones by saying, "I see her most days, but she's always a good sight, you know."