"Waiting till dark. I was going to ask at the lodge then whether you were at home."
"And if I hadn't been?"
"Gone on somewhere else, I suppose."
Jack tried to help himself to a whisky and soda, but the soda flew out all over his shirt-front like a fountain, and he was forced to make a small remark. Then he made another.
"What about prison?"
Frank smiled.
"Oh! I've almost forgotten that. It was beastly at the time, though."
"And ... and the Major and the work! Lord! Frank, you do tell a story badly."
He smiled again much more completely.
"I'm too busy inside," he said. "Those things don't seem to matter much, somehow."