“Well, as I say, I thought you were gone to glory, and being in London I saw the situation in an advertisement. Nobody was likely to know me here, even if I had minded, for I was never in Christminster in my growing up.”
“Why did you return from Australia?”
“Oh, I had my reasons… Then you are not a don yet?”
“No.”
“Not even a reverend?”
“No.”
“Nor so much as a rather reverend dissenting gentleman?”
“I am as I was.”
“True—you look so.” She idly allowed her fingers to rest on the pull of the beer-engine as she inspected him critically. He observed that her hands were smaller and whiter than when he had lived with her, and that on the hand which pulled the engine she wore an ornamental ring set with what seemed to be real sapphires—which they were, indeed, and were much admired as such by the young men who frequented the bar.
“So you pass as having a living husband,” he continued.