“You are now, aren’t you?”
“Well, I don’t dislike them,” said Lucy; “not very much.”
“Not you; and, I say, I may talk to you a bit about my engagements, mayn’t I?”
“Really, Captain Rolph,” replied Lucy, demurely, “I hardly know what to say to such a proposal as this. To how many ladies are you engaged?”
“Ladies? Engaged? Oh, come now! I say, you know, you don’t mean that. I say, you’re chaffing me, you know.”
“But you said engaged, and I knew you were engaged to Glynne Day,” cried Lucy, innocently.
“Oh, but you know I meant engagements to run at athletic meetings. Of course I’m only engaged to Glynne, but that’s no reason why a man shouldn’t have a bit of a chat to any one else—any one pretty and sympathetic, and who took an interest in a fellow’s pursuits. I say, I’ve got a wonderful match on, Lucy.”
“How dare he call me Lucy!” she thought; and an indignant flash from her eyes fell upon a white-topped button mushroom beside the road. “A pretty wretch to be engaged to poor Glynne. Oh, how stupid she must be!”
The mushroom was not snatched up, and Rolph went on talking, with his hands far down in the pockets of his ulster.
“It’s no end of a good thing, and I’m sure to win. It’s to pick up five hundred stones put five yards apart, and bring ’em back and put ’em in a basket one at a time; so that, you see, I have to do—twice five yards is ten yards the first time, and then twice ten yards the second time; and then twice twenty yards is forty yards the third time, and then twice forty yards is eighty yards the fourth time, and—Here, I say, I’m getting into a knot, I could do it if I had a pencil.”