"It isn't so much that," says the professor faintly. "It is what is she going to do?"
"Next!" supplements Hardinge. "Quite so! It would be a clever fellow who would answer that, straight off. I say, Curzon, what a pretty girl she is, though. Pretty isn't the word. Lovely, I——"
The professor gets up suddenly.
"Not that," says he, raising his hand in his gentle fashion—that has now something of haste in it. "It—I—you know what I mean, Hardinge. To discuss her—herself, I mean—and here——"
"Yes. You are right," says Hardinge slowly, with, however, an irrepressible stare at the professor. It is a prolonged stare. He is very fond of Curzon, though knowing absolutely nothing about him beyond the fact that he is eminently likeable; and it now strikes him as strange that this silent, awkward, ill-dressed, clever man should be the one to teach him how to behave himself. Who is Curzon? Given a better tailor, and a worse brain, he might be a reasonable-looking fellow enough, and not so old either—forty, perhaps—perhaps less. "Have you no relation to whom you could send her?" he says at length, that sudden curiosity as to who Curzon may be prompting the question. "Some old lady? An aunt, for example?"
"She doesn't seem to like aunts," says the professor, with deep dejection.
"Small blame to her," says Hardinge, smoking vigorously. "I've an aunt—but 'that's another story!' Well—haven't you a cousin then?—or something?"
"I have a sister," says the professor slowly.
"Married?"
"A widow."