“And who was it?” Carrie asked eagerly.
The woman who presumed to condemn my carrying-on with Dolly Hemingway and Violet Mellish sat smiling in frank innocence. She, whose ignorance of such matters was to be scrupulously respected, sat with unconsciousness on her brow, and gave graceful attention to my story. She, who had called me a belated bachelor, who had spoken of my failing years and my perspective of hesitating singleness, and, above all, whose memory needed no hint as to what I was going to say, dissembled without a quiver.
“Who was it?” Caroline repeated.
“The name is the least essential part of the affair,” I replied. “We are concerned with the stile.”
“Yes, the stile,” Millicent said. “What happened?”
“Were she to ask me herself, I should only whisper,” I returned.
She leaned back and laughed outright. “You are too considerate on her account to make the story very interesting,” she remarked. “I swear I could finish it better myself. One day you tried to kiss her.”
Millicent had chosen the hazardous line of safety. She had told the truth.
I stole a glance at her under cover of the flowers.
“I tried not to,” I replied.