It was clear to me that after that I must as people say "have things out" with Rachel. But before I could do anything of the sort the Fürstin pounced upon me. She made me sit up that night after her other guests had gone to their rooms, in the cosy little turret apartment she called her study and devoted to the reading of whatever was most notorious in contemporary British fiction. "Sit down," said she, "by the fire in that chair there and tell me all about it. It's no good your pretending you don't know what I mean. What are you up to with her, and why don't you go straight to your manifest destiny as a decent man should?"
"Because manifestly it isn't my destiny," I said.
"Stuff," said the Fürstin.
"You know perfectly well why I am out of England."
"Everybody knows—except of course quite young persons who are being carefully brought up."
"Does she know?"
"She doesn't seem to."
"Well, that's what I want to know."
"Need she know?"
"Well, it does seem rather essential——"