"Decidedly."
"But how could I answer you on that point?" she returned, letting him catch in the gloom a glimpse of her sly smile. "You're only a name to me. If you'll not think my candor rude, I haven't an idea who you are."
"I don't believe I should think you rude if you really were so," he said, smiling, and yet seeming to mean with much quiet force each word that he spoke. "So you want me to give an account of myself? Well, I'm a rather obscure fellow. That is, I don't believe I know more than ten people in New York at all well. I lead a quiet life; I'm what they call a Wall Street man, but I mingle with the big throng there only in a sort of business way. I was graduated at Dartmouth two years ago, and spent a year in Europe afterward. Then I came back, and began hard work. There were reasons why I should do so—I mean financial reasons. I'm not a New Yorker; I was born and reared in Providence. Do you know Providence?"
"No," said Claire. "I know only New York."
She was looking at him interestedly at short intervals; they had resumed their stroll again; her arm was still within his; he had continued to please her, though she felt no thrill of warm attraction toward him, however mild in degree. She had a sense of friendship, of easy familiarity. But apart from this, she was conscious, as a woman sometimes not merely will but must be, that she had won him to like her by a very easy and rapid victory. Already she was not sure but that she had won him to like her strongly as well. Her few recent words of reply had carried with them a subtle persuasion of which Hollister himself was oddly and most pleasurably conscious. He yielded to their effect, and became somewhat more free in his personal confidences.
"My father had been a Dartmouth man," he went on. "That was the reason of my going there. Father and Mother have both passed away, now. It's a lovely old college, and it gained me some strong friendships. But I find that all my favorite classmates have drifted into other cities. They sometimes write to me, even yet, after my year in Europe. But, of course, the old good feeling will shortly cease ... how can it fail to cease?... I'm a good deal alone, just now. I know a number of men there in Wall Street, but I feel a little afraid of making friends with them. I don't just know why, but I do. Perhaps it's because of getting into bad habits. Some of them, I've noticed have very bad habits. And I've made up my mind ... that is, I—I half promised my poor dear mother just before she.... Well, Miss Twining, the plain truth is that I keep regular hours and live straight, as they say. I like to take a sail down here while the weather is hot, but I nearly always take it quite by myself. To-night I happened to meet Trask on the boat. I'd nearly forgotten Trask. He was in my Freshman year with me, but he dropped off after that. It was he who introduced me to—to the Miss—excuse me, but I really forget your friend's name."
"Miss Bergemann," said Claire.
"Oh, yes—Miss Bergemann." He paused, at this point, gently forcing Claire to pause also. They were still beside the sea; the music still came to them in its modulated sweetness. Hollister bent his head quite low, looking straight down into her upturned face.
"I've told you ever so much about myself," he said. "I wish, now, that you'd give me a little knowledge also. Will you?"
"About myself?" asked Claire. "About just who I am?"