She shook her head. No. She was not an Australian either, she came from
none of the British colonies.

"You are not English," I affirmed. "You speak too well." I was piqued.
She did not answer. She smiled again and I grew angry. In the cathedral
she had smiled at the verger's commendation of particularly abominable
restorations, and that smile had drawn me toward her, had emboldened me
to offer deferential and condemnatory remarks as to the plaster-of-Paris
mouldings. You know how one addresses a young lady who is obviously
capable of taking care of herself. That was how I had come across her.
She had smiled at the gabble of the cathedral guide as he showed the
obsessed troop, of which we had formed units, the place of martyrdom of
Blessed Thomas, and her smile had had just that quality of superseder's
contempt. It had pleased me then; but, now that she smiled thus past
me--it was not quite at me--in the crooked highways of the town, I was
irritated. After all, I was somebody; I was not a cathedral verger. I
had a fancy for myself in those days--a fancy that solitude and brooding
had crystallised into a habit of mind. I was a writer with high--with
the highest--ideals. I had withdrawn myself from the world, lived
isolated, hidden in the countryside, lived as hermits do, on the hope of
one day doing something--of putting greatness on paper. She suddenly
fathomed my thoughts: "You write," she affirmed. I asked how she knew,
wondered what she had read of mine--there was so little.

"Are you a popular author?" she asked.

"Alas, no!" I answered. "You must know that."

"You would like to be?"