The jest, and its unexpectedness, struck sudden laughter from Eve. Hilliard joined in her mirth.
After that she suggested, "Hadn't we better go?"
"Yes. Let us walk quietly on. The streets are pleasant after sunset."
On rising, after he had paid the bill, Hilliard chanced to see himself in a mirror. He had flushed cheeks, and his hair was somewhat disorderly. In contrast with Eve's colourless composure, his appearance was decidedly bacchanalian; but the thought merely amused him.
They crossed Holborn, and took their way up Southampton Row, neither speaking until they were within sight of Russell Square.
"I like this part of London," said Hilliard at length, pointing before him. "I often walk about the squares late at night. It's quiet, and the trees make the air taste fresh."
"I did the same, sometimes, when I lived in Gower Place."
"Doesn't it strike you that we are rather like each other in some things?"
"Oh, yes!" Eve replied frankly. "I have noticed that."
"You have? Even in the lives we have led there's a sort of resemblance, isn't there?"