He had a little gleam of perspicacity. "What little fling?" he asked. "Who said I was going to have one?"
("Carefully, Jeffries," I cautioned myself.) Aloud I said cheerfully, "My mistake, Archie—I'm out of the running in these things—I'm rather a Puritan by necessity, you see. Perhaps I was taking it rather for granted——"
He chuckled. "A Puritan by necessity! A Puritan by Miss Whatever-her-name-is, more like! Do at least tell us if it's anybody we know, Jeff!"
But I ignored the latter part of his remark. "Well done, Archie," I applauded. "I'm glad you see that when a man's got one woman he's no need for all the others. Stick to that and you're all right."
And that clinched it. "Well, you've got the pull over me there," he said.
I made no reply.
You need not conclude, unless you wish, that I wanted to start him straight away to the devil. I couldn't have ensured his arrival at that destination if I had. But I was prepared to go half way with him if by so doing I could keep him from getting into paradise by the means I had reserved for myself. I was doing him no conspicuous harm. He would have to rub shoulders with the world before long—was already doing so; and I said no more to him—nay, I said far less—than he would have picked up for himself in almost any gathering of young men of his own age that he was likely to find himself among.... So presently, when after (how shall I put it?)—after having tapped it home that there was the one woman and also the others, I returned to the examination in Method again, I was talking as easily as if, his betrayals to Miss Windus notwithstanding, we had been the best friends in the world.
"By the way, that's another thing you're lucky in, my boy," I said. "The exam's in the daytime. I suppose that doesn't convey anything to you."
"How do you mean?"
"Well, it means something to me. I shall have to get a day off."