"No, thank you—I am sure he will be out soon … You look awfully trampled on and—mashed, Jenny," she continued, twitching the child's hat on straight. "And my dear! Don't eat so fast."
Despite himself, Varney felt his blood rising a little. "Miss Carstairs," he said slowly, "I must tell you that I came with Miss Jenny on purpose to see you. There is something that I wanted to say."
She raised her eyes then, and though their look was very young and embarrassed, he felt himself lose something of his composure under it.
"You wanted to say something—to me?"
"A good deal. I have an explanation to make—"
"I'm afraid that I have not time to—listen—Mr. Hare—"
"You must listen—to be fair," he said slowly. "I have to blame myself for it, but you are doing me an injustice at this moment. I am not—that man."
She made no answer. Beside them, Miss Jenny ate ice-cream succulently. All around them were people jostling this way and that, laughing, shouting: but they might have been alone on a mountain-top for all either was aware of them.
"Since I have been in Hunston—just a day," Varney said easily, "I seem to have done nothing but explain over and over that I am not Mr. Stanhope. I got awfully tired of it, Miss Carstairs; it seemed so horribly useless. Like the others, you insisted that I was he. You candidly didn't believe me—"
"No," she said, "that is true."