“I know,” he said, “that I don’t deserve quarter, but you are the gamest sport I ever saw and I want to be able to tell my grandchildren that I once shook hands with you. After which,” he added, “I am going down on my marrow-bones and make my most contrite obeisances.”
Miss Asheton did not this time repudiate the amenities. She smiled forgiveness.
“Why were you so atrociously horrid?” she asked, as though the psychology of his behavior mildly piqued her interest.
“You see, I was a woman-hater,” he explained.
“Oh, are you? How interesting!”
“I am not!” hotly denied Mr. Burrow.
“But you just said——”
“I just said I was. There’s a big difference between saying you were something and saying you are something. Life is a matter of tenses.”
“Oh!”
“Do you know what a woman-hater is?” inquired Mr. Burrow, as the car nosed its way deliberately along Jaffa Junction’s principal esplanade.