STEVE, darkly, ‘Don’t be so sure you know me, Alice.’
COLONEL, enjoying himself, ‘Let us tell her, Steve! I am dying to tell her.’
STEVE, grandly, ‘No, no.’
COLONEL. ‘We mustn’t tell you, Alice, because it is a woman’s secret—a poor little fond elderly woman. Our friend is very proud of his conquest. See how he is ruffling his feathers. I shouldn’t wonder you know, though you and I are in the way to-night.’
But Alice’s attention is directed in another direction: to a little white object struggling in the clutches of a closed door at the back of the room. Steve turns to see what she is looking at, and at the same moment the door opens sufficiently to allow a pretty hand to obtrude, seize the kitten, or whatever it was, and softly reclose the door. For one second Alice did think it might be a kitten, but she knows now that it is part of a woman’s dress. As for Steve thus suddenly acquainted with his recent visitor’s whereabouts, his mouth opens wider than the door. He appeals mutely to Alice not to betray his strange secret to the Colonel.
ALICE, with dancing eyes, ‘May I look about me, Steve? I have been neglecting your room shamefully.’
STEVE, alarmed, for he knows the woman, ‘Don’t get up, Alice; there is really nothing to see.’ But she is already making the journey of the room, and drawing nearer to the door.
ALICE, playing with him, ‘I like your clock.’
STEVE. ‘It is my landlady’s. Nearly all the things are hers. Do come back to the fire.’
ALICE. ‘Don’t mind me. What does this door lead into?’