The face of the infatuated youth turned white with wrath. "I think the sooner you take your filthy face through that door the better! You and your blasted impertinence!"
Dignity demanded a frigid and immediate withdrawal.
"I'll be damned!" Philip murmured, "a chap with a mind like Harry's! Lord, it was as hard as a knife! Poor old devil, I suppose he'll wake up in a month and find himself up to the neck! Who's left? That's what I want to know! All the old landmarks are washed away. What the hell is a chap to do? Who's left?" The question drummed insistently into his ears. He found himself aching for friendship. For the last few months he had hardly uttered a word excepting a request for the sugar, perhaps, and a reply to a question at school. His general friendlessness filled him with humiliation. The Walton Street phase had drawn to its dull end long ago and not a figure remained who offered the least hope of companionship. Alec, like the callous swine he had always felt Alec fundamentally to be, had merely disappeared—bearing with him the telescope of high romance, as might have been expected. On Harry the gods had inflicted a terrible cerebral affliction. Philip remembered Harry's attendant lady and shuddered. And Harry had been sweet on Edie once! Oh, yes, Edie! What was it he had heard Dorah and Benjamin saying about Edie? He remembered. Her photograph had been seen by a "millionaire" in the house of a relative of Edie in Pittsburg, U.S.A. The "millionaire," promptly enamoured, had entered into negotiations with the authorities in Doomington, the negotiations were succeeded by a trunk of the most astounding dresses and a first-class ticket to Pittsburg. So much for Edie! In any case she had worn thin ages ago. Then it was that Mamie returned to his mind.
His first thought was "Damn that girl! I thought I'd forgotten her!" She filled him with a vivid sense of guilt. "I've had enough!" he vowed. His mind returned to the episode of the signature, and to escape his contrition, he fled from the house and walked swiftly down Blenheim Road. To his horror he discovered that every step he took was actually a step nearer the enchantress. To his horror he was forced to recognize that the thought of her made him tingle with pleasure. The recollection of her began to torture him. It was a double infliction, sensations of guilt and promptings of delight struggling for mastery. When his mind returned to his mother, his despair was more abandoned than it had been since the summer. Yet ever when his gloom was most profound, the girl re-entered his thoughts, whistling as she turned the corner of the barn, brushing his cheeks with her hair.
"By God!" he exclaimed. "I lent her that prose translation of Dante!" (He remembered that she had asked who had wrote Dante, and that she had thought it so delincate of him to lend her so sweet a book. And when she'd just finished the Pansy Bright-eye Library she was reading, she'd love to learn all about this here Dante. She was sure he'd be that interesting!)
Which lack of culture had then rather accentuated than diminished her charm, a quaint sort of sophisticated naïveté. "Of course, I've got to get my book back! I'll call for it to-morrow night!"
He knocked firmly at the door of the Mamie household. A miniature version of Mamie appeared. He asked if Philip Massel could see Miss Mamie.... The child disappeared into the sitting-room half-way along the passage. A whispering which seemed to last many minutes followed. Then the child reappeared and ushered him into the room. The glare of an admirable incandescent mantle blinded him for a moment. There were three or four people in the room but immediately he only recognized Mrs. Hannetstein. A familiar voice addressed him.
"Oh, good evening, Mr.—er—Massel, so glad you've called!"
He turned to the source of the voice. Good heavens, was that Mamie? Hell, she'd got her hair up! You couldn't quite compare her to Harry's discovery, but she was years older than she had seemed! He was aware she had called him Mr. Massel. He would have to follow suit. Perhaps it was mere intrigue. He held out his arm waveringly. "Good evening, Miss..." He found, to his despair, he had entirely forgotten her surname. "I mean, Miss..." He coughed unhappily. But Mamie, so far from assisting him in his embarrassment, was unaware of it.
"Mother, this is Mr. Massel! We met, where was it? Oh, of course, in Wenton. Do you remember this gentleman, auntie? He helped me to escape from some cows, didn't you?"