Crocker smiled in the darkness; he had been too “cranky” to belong to Shelton's “set.”
“You never were much like your 'set,' old chap,” he said.
Shelton turned away, sniffing the perfume of the limes. Images were thronging through his mind. The faces of his old friends strangely mixed with those of people he had lately met—the girl in the train, Ferrand, the lady with the short, round, powdered face, the little barber; others, too, and floating, mysterious,—connected with them all, Antonia's face. The scent of the lime-trees drifted at him with its magic sweetness. From the street behind, the footsteps of the passers-by sounded muffled, yet exact, and on the breeze was borne the strain: “For he's a jolly good fellow!”
“For he's a jolly good fellow! For he's a jolly good fe-ellow! And so say all of us!”
“Ah!” he said, “they were good chaps.”
“I used to think,” said Crocker dreamily, “that some of them had too much side.”
And Shelton laughed.
“The thing sickens me,” said he, “the whole snobbish, selfish business. The place sickens me, lined with cotton-wool-made so beastly comfortable.”
Crocker shook his head.
“It's a splendid old place,” he said, his eyes fastening at last on Shelton's boots. “You know, old chap,” he stammered, “I think you—you ought to take care!”