And Alex, in her complicated disappointment at disappointing her mother and father, answered hastily in the affirmative.
In the autumn, in Scotland, she met Noel Cardew again.
They were staying at the same house. Alex felt childishly proud of saying, when her hostess brought the young man to her side, with a word of introduction:
"Oh, but we've met before! I know him quite well."
She wished that she had spoken less emphatically, at the sight of Noel's politely non-committal smile. It was evident that he had not the faintest recollection of the meeting at his mother's house in Devonshire. She reminded him of it rather shyly.
"Oh, yes, of course. You were at school with my young cousins. I remember you coming over to see us quite well, with your brothers. We all played hunt the slipper or something, didn't we?"
"Hide-and-seek," said Alex literally. She wondered why encounters which remained quite vividly in her own memory should always appear to present themselves so indistinctly and trivially to other people.
"I haven't heard from your cousins for a long while. Are they in America?"
"Diana is in India, of course. She married, you know—a fellow in the Indian Police."
"I remember," said Alex, determined to ignore the tiny prick of jealousy that now habitually assailed her almost every time that she heard of the marriage of another girl.