“Hallo!” said Wallace Chesney. “So you’re back?”
We fell into conversation, and I had not been in the room two minutes before I realised that what I had been told about the change in him was nothing more than the truth. The man’s bearing and his every remark were insufferably bumptious. He spoke of his prospects in the July medal competition as if the issue were already settled. He scoffed at his rivals.
I had some little difficulty in bringing the talk round to the matter which I had come to discuss.
“My boy,” I said at length, “I have just heard the sad news.”
“What sad news?”
“I have been talking to Charlotte—”
“Oh, that!” said Wallace Chesney.
“She was telling me—”
“Perhaps it’s all for the best.”
“All for the best? What do you mean?”