It was afternoon on the day he got Graham's letter before he could leave home, and four o'clock had struck before he knocked at the hall-door of the little house in Knightsbridge.
When he came into the room where Marion Durrant sat hemming an apron, she said:
"What! come again to-day! In the name of wonder, what brought you here now?'
"You know, May, the pressure of race is ever from east to west,"
"The pressure of race! What on earth are you talking about? Don't! that hurts my hand."
"I was slapping your hand to prevent you from fainting at the unexpected sight of your slave and master. I meant the pressure of the human race--or more accurately, the attraction of the inhuman race--meaning yourself, sweetheart."
"Do you know, Charlie, you always begin a conversation as if you wanted me to think you clever; and if there is one thing I hate it is cleverness in a man."
"Do you know, Miss Durrant, you never by any means allow me to begin a conversation. Before I am fully in the room you always fly at me with some question or other."
"But you are so slow, Charlie. You take up half an hour getting ready to say 'Howd'y'do'; and if there is one thing more odious in a man than cleverness it is slowness."
"But you must admit. Miss Durrant, that if, when we meet, I am slow of speech, I am not slow in other matters proper to our meeting."