“Oh, rot,” he said lamely, hating the subject.
Maddox was silent a moment.
“’Tisn’t quite rot,” he said. “But then there came a thing, which I dare say you’ve forgotten, only I haven’t. You came in from playing squash one wet afternoon, and you and your innocence made me suddenly see what a beast I was.”
David could not help giving a little shudder, but the moment after he was ashamed of it.
“I don’t care what you were like before,” he said. “But what I’m perfectly sure of is that since then—I remember it very well—you’ve been all right.”
“Yes.”
“There you are, then!” said David.
Frank was still lying with his hat over his face, but now he pushed it back and looked at David.
“It’s all serene for you,” he said, “because you’ve always been a straight chap. But it’s different for me. I feel just rotten.”
David scratched his head in some perplexity. The whole matter was vague and repugnant to him, and he did not want to hear more or know more. There were such heaps of jolly proper things in the world to be interested in and curious about. But he understood without any vagueness at all and with the very opposite of repulsion, that his friend was in trouble, and that he wanted sympathy with that. So the whole of his devoted little heart went out there. It was bad trouble, too, the worst trouble a fellow could have.