"I came to tell you that my nephew has started for Japan, and that he has promised me upon his oath that he will never speak again of what he gabbled so foolishly. He meant no harm. But stupid people generally manage to do a good deal. The worst of Geoff's stupidity was that it was the truth which he blurted out."
"I knew it," said Janey below her breath. "I was sure of it."
"So was I," said Mr. Stirling sadly. "One can't tell why one believes certain things and disbelieves others. But Geoff's voice had that mysterious thing the ring of truth in it. I knew at once you recognized that. That is why I am here."
Janey looked straight in front of her.
"Of course I hoped, you and I both hoped," he continued, "that Geoff might have been mistaken. But he was not. He was so determined to prove to me that he was not that he unpacked one of his boxes already packed to start for Japan, and got out his last year's notebooks. I kept one of them. He did not like it, but I thought it was safer with me than with him."
Mr. Stirling produced out of a much-battered pocket a small sketch-book with an elastic band round it, and turned the leaves. Each page was crowded with pencil studies of architecture, figures, dogs, children, nursemaids; small elaborate drawings of door-knockers and leaden pipe-heads; vague scratches of officials and soldiers, the individuality of each caught in a few strokes. He turned the pages with a certain respectful admiration.
"He has the root of the matter in him," he said. "He will arrive."
Janey was not impressed. She thought the sketches very unfinished.
Then he stopped at a certain page. Neither of them could help smiling. The head waiter, as seen from behind, napkin on arm, dish on spread hand, superb, debonair, stout but fleet.
Alphonse was scribbled under it, Fontainebleau, Sept. the tenth, and the year.