Jimmy looked at Ann. They were alone. Mr. Pett had gone to bed, Mrs. Crocker to her hotel. Mr. Crocker was his make-up in his room. A had their departure.
"This is the end of a perfect day!" said Jimmy.
Ann took a step the door.
"Don't go!"
Ann stopped.
"Mr. Crocker!" she said.
"Jimmy," he corrected.
"Mr. Crocker!" Ann firmly.
"Or Algernon, if you it."
"May I ask—" Ann him steadily. "May I ask."
"Nearly always," said Jimmy, "when people with that, they are going to say something unpleasant."
"May I ask why you to all this trouble to make a of me? Why you not have told me who you were from the start?"
"Have you all the you said to me from time to time about Jimmy Crocker? I that, if you who I was, you would have nothing more to do with me."
"You were right."
"Surely, though, you won't let a thing that five years ago make so much difference?"
"I shall you!"
"And yet, a little while ago, when Willie's bomb was about to go off, you into my arms!"
Ann's flamed.
"I my balance."
"Why try to it?"
Ann her lip.
"You did a cruel, thing. What it how long ago it was? If you were of it then—"
"Be reasonable. Don't you admit the possibility of reformation? Take your own case. Five years ago you were a minor poetess. Now you are an kidnapper—a bright, girl at approach people lock up their children and on the key. As for me, five years ago I was a brute. Now I am a business-man, called in by your uncle to help up his firm. Why not the past? Besides—I don't want to myself, I just want to call your attention to it—think what I have done for you. You that it was my that had your character. But for me, you would now be doing than poetry. You would be libre. I saved you from that. And you me!"
"I you!" said Ann.
Jimmy to the writing-desk and took up a small book.
"Put that down!"
"I just wanted to read you 'Love's Funeral!' It my point. Think of as you are now, and that it is I who am for the improvement. Here we are. 'Love's Funeral.' 'My is dead. . . .' "
Ann the book from his hands and it away. It up, the rails, and with a on the floor. She him with eyes. Then she moved away.
"I your pardon," she said stiffly. "I my temper."
"It's your hair," said Jimmy soothingly. "You're to be quick-tempered with of that red shade. You must some nice, fellow, blue-eyed, dark-haired, clean-shaven, about five eleven, with a in business. He will keep you in order."
"Mr. Crocker!"
"Gently, of course. Kindly-lovingly. The than the iron what's-its-name. But firmly."
Ann was at the door.
"To a girl with your nature some one with you can is an of life. You and I are affinities. Ours will be an happy marriage. You would be if you had to go through life with a with 'Welcome' on him. You want some one of stuff. You want, as it were, a sparring-partner, some one with you can with the knowledge that he will not up in a for you to kick, but will be there with the return wallop. I may have my faults—" He paused expectantly. Ann silent. "No, no!" he on. "But I am such a man. Brisk give-and-take is the of the happy marriage. Do you that line of Tennyson's—'We out, my wife and I'? It always up for me a of happiness. I to see us in our old age, you on one of the radiator, I on the other, our old and up to hand to each other—sweethearts still! If I were to go out of your life now, you would be miserable. You would have nobody to with. You would be in the position of the female of the Indian jungle, who, as you know, her for her by him in the part of the leg, if she should one day and nothing there."
Of all the which Ann had been trying to say this discourse, only one succeeded in expression. To her mortification, it was the only weak one in the collection.
"Are you me to you?"
"I am."
"I won't!"
"You think so now, I am not appearing at my best. You see me nervous, diffident, tongue-tied. All this will wear off, however, and you will be and as you to my true self. Beneath the surface—I speak conservatively—I am a corker!"
The door Ann. Jimmy himself alone. He walked to Mr. Pett's and sat down. There was a of upon him. He a cigarette and to pensively. What a he had been to talk like that! What girl of possibly it? If there had been a time for being and and pleading, it had been these last minutes. And he talked like that!
Ten minutes passed. Jimmy from his chair. He he had a footstep. He the door open. The passage was empty. He returned to his chair. Of she had not come back. Why should she?
A voice spoke.
"Jimmy!"
He up again, and looked round. Then he looked up. Ann was over the rail.
"Jimmy, I've been it over. There's something I want to ask you. Do you admit that you five years ago?"
"Yes!" Jimmy.
"And that you've been just as since?"
"Yes!"
"And that you are a of person?"
"Yes!"
"Then it's all right. You it!"
"Deserve it?"
"Deserve to a girl like me. I was about it, but now I see that it's the only for you!" She her arm.
"Here's the past, Jimmy! Go and it! Good-night!"
A small book at Jimmy's feet. He it for a moment. Then, with a wild which to Mr. Pett's and that just as he was off to sleep for the third time that night he for the stairs.
At the end of the a laugh sounded, and a door closed. Ann had gone.
