He shook his head.
“No, not that! Only as I am something of an idealist, and you, I suppose, have placed yourself amongst the ranks of the realists, we should scarcely meet upon a common basis. But will you forgive me if I say so—I am very sure that some day you will be a deserter?”
“And why?”
“Friends,” she repeated, with a certain wistfulness in her tone
“I do not know anything of your history,” he continued gently, “nor am I asking for your confidence. Only in your story there was a personal note, which seemed to me to somehow explain the bitterness and directness with which you wrote—of certain subjects. I think that you yourself have had trouble—or perhaps a dear friend has suffered, and her grief has become yours. There was a little poison in your pen, I think. Never mind! We shall be friends, and I shall watch it pass away!”
“Friends,” she repeated with a certain wistfulness in her tone. “But have you forgotten—what you came for?”
“I do not think,” he said slowly, “that it is of much consequence.”
“But it is,” she insisted. “You asked me distinctly where I wished to be driven to from the theatre, and I told you—home! All the time I knew that I was going to have supper with Mr. Thorndyke at the Milan! Morally I lied to you!”