It reduced me to stammering. “I have never—such a juncture has never—”
“Of course you wouldn’t. Even a Northerner!”
His face, as he said this, was a single glittering piece of fierceness. I was still so much taken aback that I said rather flatly: “But who has to?”
“I have to.” With this he abruptly turned on his heel and left me standing on the steps. For a moment I stared after him; and then, as I rang the bell, he was back again; and with that formality which at times overtook him he began: “I will ask you to excuse my hasty—”
“Oh, John Mayrant! What a notion!”
But he was by no means to be put off, and he proceeded with stiffer formality: “I feel that I have not acted politely just now, and I beg to assure you that I intended no slight.”
My first impulse was to lay a hand upon his shoulder and say to him: “My dear fellow, stuff and nonsense!” Thus I should have treated any Northern friend; but here was no Northerner. I am glad that I had the sense to feel that any careless, good-natured putting away of his deliberate and definitely tendered apology would seem to him a “slight” on my part. His punctilious value for certain observances between man and man reached me suddenly and deeply, and took me far from the familiarity which breeds contempt.
“Why, John Mayrant,” I said, “you could never offend me unless I thought that you wished to, and how should I possibly think that?”
“Thank you,” he replied very simply.
I rang the bell a second time. “If we can get into the house,” I suggested, “won’t you stop and dine with me?”