'
'Who told you she had?'
'She told me so herself.'
'Do you mean to tell me you believe it?'
He looked puzzled. 'Why should she say that if it isn't true? She
could have no object in making such a statement. As a matter of fact,
I found out quite by accident, when she unconsciously quoted a passage
from the great master.'
I began to see light. So that was why Gladys had come up in such haste
the day following her introduction to William to borrow _Johnson's
Aphorisms_. Oh, hapless, artless William!
'I see now that you were quite right when you once remarked that you
feared you had lost your reason with your beard,' I remarked severely.
'Do let things grow again before it is too late.'
'Let what grow?' he asked.
'Everything. Moustache, beard and general air of fuzziness. It's the
best protection you can have, my poor fellow.'
He departed rather abruptly after that, seeming somewhat annoyed. I
could not understand what was making him so unusually touchy.
'Surely,' I said to Henry, 'even William isn't so blind as to let
himself be taken in by that little noodle of a Gladys.'
'Of course he isn't,' replied Henry vehemently, 'do you think a chap is
ever deceived by anything like that? He hates to be pounced on, so to
speak. Do you know, my dear, that one of the things that first
attracted you to me was your complete indifference to myself.
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