“No.”

“You weren’t?”

He spoke quickly, with a sort of relief, hesitated then added sardonically:

“But of course you know—and much worse than the worst. The art of conversation isn’t dead yet, whatever the—perhaps you saw me being got out?”

“No, I didn’t.”

“But you do know?”

“Naturally.”

“I say, I wish you’d let me have—”

He checked himself abruptly, and muttered:

“Good God! What a brute I am.”