‘I’m sorry. I rather thought you loved me. A fine blow to my conceit.’ ‘I do love you,’ I said. ‘I love you dreadfully. You’ve made me very unhappy and I’ve been crying all night because I thought I should never see you again.’ When I said this I remember he laughed, and stretched his hand to me across the breakfast table. ‘Bless you for that,’ he said; ‘one day, when you reach that exalted age of thirty-six which you told me was your ambition, I’ll remind you of this moment. And you won’t believe me. It’s a pity you have to grow up.’
