“Yes, I—”
“And you are going alone?”
“Yes.”
“Would you mind—would it trouble you too much to walk with me as far as our house?”
“Why—why of course not. I shall be delighted. But I thought you—I thought Ed Raymond—”
“No, I'm alone. Wait here; I will be ready in just a minute.”
She hurried away. He gazed after her in bewilderment. She and he had scarcely exchanged a word during the evening, and now, when the evening was almost over, she came and asked him to be her escort. What in the wide world—?
The minute she had specified had hardly elapsed when she reappeared, ready for out of doors. She took his arm and they walked down the steps of the hotel, past the group of lights at the head of the drive and along the road, with the moon shining down upon it and the damp, salt breeze from the ocean blowing across it. They walked for the first few minutes in silence. There were a dozen questions he would have liked to ask, but his jealous resentment had not entirely vanished and his pride forbade. It was she who spoke first.
“Albert,” she said, “you must think this very odd.”
He knew what she meant, but he did not choose to admit it.