“I admire lazy people,” said Burton.
“Oh, how gallant you are! I suppose if I had said I was lame you would have admired lame people?”
“But I spoke seriously,” he protested. “I don’t say I admire one who is chronically lazy, but I do respect the man or woman who can forget the rush of life now and again and lapse into a period of laziness. ‘Leisure,’ some people call it, and it is closely identified with culture, which brings us around to the poets and the painters and art generally.”
“Speaking of art, did I ever let you see my pictures? I have a few I gathered when I was East at college. Oh, yes, and my photographs. That is where so many acquaintances start, you know, over the family album, while one expounds to someone who doesn’t care the tribal history of people he doesn’t know.”
The sentence was ended on the stairs. In a minute she was down with a basketful of photographs.
“Now, Mr. Ray, you shall behold the friends of my girlhood—up to date. By the way, when are you going to let me into the mystery of your surname? One of these days some of the neighbours will call, and I shall have to introduce you as ‘Our man Ray.’ Here I have told you my history from Alpha to Omega, and all I know about you is that your first name is Ray. When, please sir, will I be sufficiently established in your confidence to be entrusted with your name?”
For a moment he hesitated. What she said was true. She had given large confidences and received little. Why should he not tell his name? Why, indeed, should he not tell her all? He was sure that it could not change her attitude toward him; he was sure that his trust would never be betrayed, and the weight of his secret was hanging heavy about his life. That strange human instinct which demands the right of confidence the privilege of confession, was becoming irresistibly strong within him.
“I have a reason for concealing my name,” he said at length. “I do not wish to tell the name until I can tell the reason also.”
“And when will that be, may I ask?” It was a respectful question, not a demand for information.
“Oh, perhaps the next time we chat together,” he laughed, anxious to shelve the matter for the moment. “Now, let us see these photographs.”