His scheme—his invention—his Machine!
"End of it all, if he went complicating matters by starting a girl!"
Take up all his time. Interrupt—putting him off his job—yes, he knew! Putting him off, like this afternoon in the yard, and that other night at the Dance. Only more so. Incessant. "Mustn't have it; quite simply, he must not."
Messing up his whole chance of a career, if——
But he was pulling himself up in time from that danger.
Up to now he hadn't realised that there might be something in all that rot of old Hugo's about the struggle in a man's mind between an Aeroplane and a Girl. Now—well, he'd realised. All the better. Now he was forewarned. Good thing he could take a side for himself now.
By the time he'd reached the door of the National Portrait Gallery and stood waiting for his motor omnibus, he had definitely taken that resolution of which Gwenna Williams did not know.
Namely, that he must drop seeing the Girl. Have nothing more to say to her. It was better so; wiser. Whatever he'd promised about taking her up would have to be "off."
A pity—! Dashed shame a man couldn't have everything! She was ... so awfully sweet....
Still, got to decide one way or the other.