"It will be a very pleasant party," said Harris. "They gave me a bid, too, but it's steamer day to-morrow, and I've got to get my mail ready for the Crown Prince Eitel. Mrs. Adair is to be there."
Hemingway nodded, and with pleasant anticipation waited. Of Mrs. Adair, Harris always spoke with reverent enthusiasm, and the man who loved her delighted to listen. But this time Harris disappointed him.
"And Fearing, too," he added.
Again Hemingway nodded. The conjunction of the two names surprised him, but he made no sign. Loquacious as he knew Harris to be, he never before had heard his friend even suggest the subject that to Zanzibar had become of acute interest.
Harris filled the two glasses, and began to pace the room. When he spoke it was in the aggrieved tone of one who feels himself placed in a false position.
"There's no one," he complained suddenly, "so popularly unpopular as the man who butts in. I know that, but still I've always taken his side. I've always been for him." He halted, straddling with legs apart and hands deep in his trousers pockets, and frowned down upon his guest.
"Suppose," he began aggressively, "I see a man driving his car over a cliff. If I tell him that road will take him over a cliff, the worst that can happen to me is to be told to mind my own business, and I can always answer back: 'I was only trying to help you.' If I don't speak, the man breaks his neck. Between the two, it seems to me, sooner than have any one's life on my hands, I'd rather be told to mind my own business."
Hemingway stared into his glass. His expression was distinctly disapproving, but, undismayed, the consul continued.
"Now, we all know that this morning you gave that polo pony to Lady Firth, and one of us guesses that you first offered it to some one else, who refused it. One of us thinks that very soon, to-morrow, or even to-night, at this party you may offer that same person something else, something worth more than a polo pony, and that if she refuses that, it is going to break you all up, is going to hurt you for the rest of your life."
Lifting his eyes from his glass, Hemingway shot at his friend a glance of warning. In haste, Harris continued: