‘I hate tennis-parties!’ answered he, with needless emphasis.
‘Then why did you come?’
‘I came to see you.’
‘To see me!’ Maud looked at him and laughed. ‘That’s good! As if you didn’t see me nearly every day of your life!’
‘I never seem to see you alone now for a moment,’ returned Lewis discontentedly. ‘You always have a crowd of people round you, or that everlasting Philip. I never can get in a word edgeways!’
Maud looked at him, and patted his arm gently with her delicately gloved hand.
‘Now don’t be silly and tiresome, Lewis. You know you haven’t any real grievance. Is this the grotto? It is very pretty. Shall we sit down here a little while? Now you can talk to your heart’s content.’
They did sit down, but at the same time Lewis did not seem to have very much to say. He looked at Maud, and looked at the trickling water, and held his peace. He had got the chance he wanted, but he did not seem to know how to use it.
Maud, too, was silent—and if not embarrassed, at any rate less ready than usual to chatter to him. She sat with a look of gravity stamped upon her face, which deepened as moments went by.
‘Well, Maud,’ said Lewis, looking up at length, ‘I suppose we are both of us thinking about the same subject.’