I put a log on the fire and took up a book. All this was none of my business, as I had explained to Evadne.
"I'm sorry you're not interested in my conversation," she remarked after a while.
"You gave me to understand that it was over--as far as I was concerned."
"Never mind. I want to tell you something."
I laid down my book and lit a cigar.
"Go ahead," said I.
It was then that she told me of her last interview with Lackaday. Remember I had not yet read his version.
"It's all pretty hopeless," she concluded.
For myself I knew nothing of the reasons that bade him adopt the attitude of the Mysterious Unknown--except his sensitiveness on the point of his profession. He would rather die than appear before her imagination in the green silk tights of Petit Patou. I asked tentatively whether he had spoken much of his civilian life.
"Very little. Except of his knowledge of Europe. He has travelled a great deal. But of his occupation, family and the rest, I know nothing. Oh yes, he did once say that his father and mother died when he was a baby and that he had no kith or kin in the world. If he had thought fit to tell me more he would have done so. I, of course, asked no questions."