I hesitated.
"Well?"
"I don't know, Arthur. I've no plans. If you have any suggestions to make...."
"Come and spend Whitsun with me in Hampshire."
"Done."
"You're not married?"
"'Sir,'" I said in words Sir James Murray believes Dr. Johnson ought to have used, "'in order to be facetious it is not necessary to be indecent.'"
"And never will be, I suppose."
"I've no plans. You, of course...."
I paused delicately, in part because I was sure he wanted to tell me all about himself, in part because I could not for the life of me remember what had come of the domestic side of his career during my absence abroad. He was married, and the father of a certain number of children before I left England; I had no idea how far the ramifications went.