bored him so, talking about thievish clerks, he can't even answer
an honest question."

But Russell was beginning to recover his outward composure. "Try
me again," he said. "I'm afraid I was thinking of something
else."

This was the best he found to say. There was a part of him that
wanted to protest and deny, but he had not heat enough, in the
chill that had come upon him. Here was the first "mention" of
Alice, and with it the reason why it was the first: Mr. Palmer
had difficulty in recalling her, and she happened to be spoken
of, only because her father's betrayal of a benefactor's trust
had been so peculiarly atrocious that, in the view of the
benefactor's family, it contained enough of the element of humour
to warrant a mild laugh at a club. There was the deadliness of
the story: its lack of malice, even of resentment. Deadlier
still were Mrs. Palmer's phrases: "a pushing sort of girl,"
"a very pushing little person," and "used to be a bit TOO
conspicuous, in fact." But she spoke placidly and by chance;
being as obviously without unkindly motive as Mr. Palmer was
when he related the cause of Alfred Lamb's amusement. Her
opinion of the obscure young lady momentarily her topic had been
expressed, moreover, to her husband, and at her own table. She
sat there, large, kind, serene--a protest might astonish but
could not change her; and Russell, crumpling in his strained
fingers the lace-edged little web of a napkin on his knee, found
heart enough to grow red, but not enough to challenge her.

She noticed his colour, and attributed it to the embarrassment of