She said as much. So far she saw into herself and no farther.

The Northern Heights were favourable to this interview, for the taxi
broke down in an attempt to scale East Heath Road, so that we walked the
last few hundred yards together to her door.

It was while we were walking that--stung by a sudden fear, a reminiscence
of the afternoon--I asked her: Was there anybody else?

No, she said, there wasn't. How could there be? Hadn't she told me she
liked me better than anybody else, next to Reggie?

"Are you sure?" I said. "Are you quite sure?"

She stopped in the middle of the road and looked at me.

"Of course," she said. "There _isn't_ anybody. Except poor, funny little
Jevons. And you couldn't mean him."

That was as near as we got to him then.

But a week later--the week before Easter--he came to us suddenly in my
rooms where Viola was correcting proofs for me.

He had come to tell us of his good luck. His novel had been accepted.

I was glad, of course. But Viola was more than glad. She was excited,
agitated. She jumped up and said: "Oh, Jimmy!" (She called him Jimmy, and
her voice told me that it was not for the first time.) "Jimmy! How