“Both of us know the world, my dear fellow,” answered Captain Erle Brooker at last, standing astride before the fireplace in which a gaudy Japanese umbrella had been placed to hide its ugliness. “Surely the five years we spent together were sufficient to show us that there are women—and women?”
“Of course, as I expected,” the other cried cynically. “Now that you’re back again in England, buried in this sleepy country village, you are becoming sentimental. I suppose it is respectable to be so; but it’s hardly like you.”
“You’ve prospered. I’ve fallen upon evil days.”
“And you could have had similar luck if only you would have continued to run with me that snug little place in Nice, instead of showing the white feather,” he said.
“It was entirely against my grain to fleece those beardless boys. I’ll play fair, or not at all.”
“Sentiment again! It’s your curse, Brooker.”
“The speculation no doubt proved a veritable gold mine, as of course it must. But I had a second reason in dissolving our partnership.”
“Liane urged you?”
“Yes.”
“And you took her advice, the advice of a mere girl!” he laughed contemptuously.