Hugo hesitated.
'Yes,' he said, and lapsed into reflection.
'I shall see you home,' he said.
'I am going to walk,' she replied. 'And I have to get my things from the cloak-room.'
'I will walk with you,' he said.
'What style the woman has!' he thought, enraptured.
They proceeded southwards in silence. Then suddenly she asked how he had left Mr. Darcy, and they began to talk about Darcy and Paris. Hugo encouraged her. He wished to know the worst.
'Except my father,' she said, 'I have never met anyone with more sense than Mr. Darcy, or anyone more kind. I might have been dead now if it hadn't been for Mr. Darcy.'
'Mr. Darcy is a very decent fellow,' Hugo remarked experimentally.