pig in a street fête with a girl from the boulevards sitting on the pig
with me and holding me round the neck before a thousand people. What
will she think of me? What but one thing can she possibly think? Oh, I
know well enough! I saw her face before she turned away. And," he cried,
"I can't even go to her and explain--if there's anything to explain, and
I suppose there is not. I can't even go to her. I've sworn not to see
her."

"Oh, I'll do that," said the other man. "I'll explain it to her, if any
explanation's necessary. I think you'll find that she will laugh at it."

But Ste. Marie shook his head.

"No, she won't," said he.

And Hartley could say no more; for he knew Miss Benham, and he was very
much afraid that she would not laugh.

They found a fiacre at the side of the square and drove home at once.
They were almost entirely silent all the long way, for Ste. Marie was
buried in gloom, and the Englishman, after trying once or twice to cheer
him up, realized that he was best left to himself just then, and so held
his tongue. But in the rue d'Assas, as Ste. Marie was getting
down--Hartley kept the fiacre to go on to his rooms in the Avenue de
l'Observatoire--he made a last attempt to lighten the man's depression.
He said:

"Don't you be a silly ass about this! You're making much too much of it,
you know. I'll go to her to-morrow or next day and explain, and she'll
laugh---if she hasn't already done so. You know," he said, almost