"Report?" I repeated, evasively.
"Yes, you promised to do that, and I always expect people to fulfil their promises to me. You came here by the way of the Holly Sprig Inn, didn't you?"
I assented. "A very roundabout way," she said. "It would have been seven miles nearer if you had come by the cross-road. But I suppose you thought you must go there first."
"That is what I thought," I answered.
"Have you been thinking about her all the time you have been away?"
"Nearly all the time."
"And actually cut off a big slice of your vacation in order to see her?"
I replied that this was precisely the state of the case.
"But, after all, you weren't successful. You need not tell me anything about that—I knew it as soon as I saw you this morning. But I will ask you to answer one thing: Is the decision final?"
I sighed—I could not help it, but she did not even smile. "Yes," I said, "the affair is settled definitely."