Mendel laughed.
“I’ve just sold one,” he said. “I came straight back from the exhibition and painted it. They sell just as if they were a new kind of toy that is all the rage.”
So they kept up a cheerful rattle of conversation until Clowes said she really must go. No; she would not have tea, but she hoped Mendel would come to tea with her one day.
He saw her to the front door and ran upstairs again, three steps at a time.
“Now, then,” he said, “what have you come for, and why did you bring her?”
“In case there was nothing to be said and this visit was another failure. I’m sick of failure; aren’t you?”
“I didn’t answer your letter. I thought it was all over.”
“But I told you what had made me change.”
“It was nothing to do with that. Everything seemed all over, and I’m not sure even now that it isn’t.”
“I knew something was happening to you. What is it?”