“Oh, I don’t know. A girl can’t have too many adventures, especially if they’re amusing ones. Do you think she can? There isn’t a man in the theatre who has eyes for anyone but you.”
“It’s not my fault. I’d almost rather they hadn’t any eyes at all.”
She laughed, as if something I had said had tickled her.
“It’s not good wishing that; they have—big ones where a women is concerned. There is my carriage. The commissionaire will open the door for you; I didn’t bring a footman. Tell them where to drive. Good-night. No thanks! Delighted it’s of use to you.”
I left her at the top of the steps which led into the street. At the foot a brougham was standing. As I went down the steps she signalled to the porter, or commissionaire, or whatever he was, who, I suppose, was attached to the theatre. He held the brougham door open for me to enter. I stepped in, waving my hand to her in farewell greeting, and the door was closed. I gave the commissionaire my address, leaned back among the cushions—lovely cushions they were, like down to one’s back!—congratulating myself on having got rid of my late companions, and of being in the possession of so charming a conveyance. Jane’s shoes were pinching me cruelly. I was thinking to myself that since, fortunately, I was alone, I should be able to take them off at once—even if I had to enter the house barefooted. The brougham moved off. I took it for granted that we had started, and was already leaning forward to take off those wretched shoes—the agony they were occasioning me seemed to have suddenly become more intense than ever—when, before we could have gone more than three or four yards, with a little jerk we stopped. The door was opened, someone came floundering in, the door was shut with a bang; we were off again—this time at a good round pace, which plainly meant business.
They say that women are fond of italics and notes of exclamation, and I daresay I am fonder of them than I ought to be—it is so convenient to put a mark which expresses a great deal without your having to go to the trouble of explaining just what. But all the italics and notes of exclamation put together would be incapable of even hinting at what my feelings were when I realised that the object who had come blundering in upon my privacy was the bald-headed creature who had been sitting on the other side of the sour little woman. The discovery of his identity set my brain—which had been settling down into a condition of normal quiescence—in a whirl again. Had I been the victim of a deep-laid plot? What was the meaning of the wretch’s presence there?
His demeanour, the words with which he addressed me, the matter-of-fact air with which he uttered them, made the confusion worse confounded.
“The idea of finding you in here! Best joke I ever had in my life! You little dear!”
He put out his hand and felt for mine. I fancy that the rapidity with which I withdrew myself as far as possible from him into the opposite corner a little startled him.
“How dare you intrude yourself in here?”