I looked down. It was the First of the Barons with the black bag and an umbrella. Was I mad? Was I sane? He was asking me to share the latter. But I was exceedingly nice, a trifle diffident, appropriately reverential. Together we walked through the mud and slush.
Now, there is something peculiarly intimate in sharing an umbrella.
It is apt to put one on the same footing as brushing a man’s coat for him—a little daring, naïve.
I longed to know why he sat alone, why he carried the bag, what he did all day. But he himself volunteered some information.
“I fear,” he said, “that my luggage will be damp. I invariably carry it with me in this bag—one requires so little—for servants are untrustworthy.”
“A wise idea,” I answered. And then: “Why have you denied us the pleasure—”
“I sit alone that I may eat more,” said the Baron, peering into the dusk; “my stomach requires a great deal of food. I order double portions, and eat them in peace.”
Which sounded finely Baronial.
“And what do you do all day?”
“I imbibe nourishment in my room,” he replied, in a voice that closed the conversation and almost repented of the umbrella.