"I didn't expect to see you at Dieppe."
He looked at her--just looked--and she was a conscience-stricken wretch. Had he accused her, at the top of his voice, of deliberate falsehood, he could not have shamed her more.
"I meant to come to Dieppe. I thought you knew it."
She had known it; all pretence to the contrary was brushed away like so much cobweb. And she knew that he knew she knew it. It was dreadful. What could she say to this extraordinary man? She blundered from bad to worse. Fumbling with the buttons of her little jacket she took out from some inner receptacle a small flat leather case.
"I think this got into that box of chocolates by mistake."
He glanced at it out of the corner of his eye, then continued to draw figures on the pavement with the ferrule of his stick.
"No mistake. I put it there. I thought you'd understand."
Thought she would understand! What did he think she would understand? Did the man suppose that everyone took things for granted?
"I think it was a mistake."
"How? When I sent to New York for it specially for you?" So that question was solved. She was conscious of a small flutter of satisfaction. "Don't you think it's pretty?"