"'What's all right?'
"'Your protégée. I've written to the parson at Besbery. The story she told us was gospel truth.'
"'I never thought it was anything else.'
"'Ah, that's because you're over head and ears in love with her,' said Gerald.
"I felt myself blushing furiously, blushing like a girl whose secret penchant for the hero of her dreams stands revealed. Of course I protested that nothing was farther from my thoughts than love; that I was only sorry for the girl's loneliness and helplessness. Gerald obviously doubted me; and I had to listen to his sage counsel on the subject. He was my senior by two years, and claimed to be a man of the world, while I had been brought up at my mother's apron-string. He foresaw dangers of which I had no apprehension.
"'There is nothing easier to drop into than an entanglement of that sort,' he said. 'You had much better fall in love with a ballet-girl. It may be more expensive for the moment, and there may be a bigger rumpus about it, but it won't compromise your future.'
"This friendly remonstrance had no effect upon my conduct during the few remaining days of the long vacation. I went to Ormond Street a second and a third time in the course of those few days. I took Esperanza to an afternoon concert at the St. James's Hall, and enjoyed her ecstasy as she listened to Sainton and Bottesini. For her, music was a passion, and I believe she sat beside me utterly unconscious of my existence, with a soul lifted above earth and all earthly feelings.
"'You were happy while the music lasted,' I said, as we walked back to Ormond Street, by a longish round, for I chose the quietest streets rather than the nearest way.
"'More than happy,' she answered softly. 'I was talking with my father's spirit.'
"'You still believe in the communion of the dead and the living,' I said, 'in spite of the tricks your German friends played upon you?'