u mean by 'them'? Not anybody else in the hotel?"

"Good heavens, no!" cried Bob, finding a fair target for his scorn at
last. "Do you think I care twopence what's said or thought by people I
never saw in my life before and am never likely to see again? I know how
I'm behaving. What does it matter what they think? Not that they're
likely to bother their heads about us any more than we do about them."

"You don't know that."

"I certainly don't care," declared my lordly youth, with obvious
sincerity. "No, I was only thinking of poor old George Kennerley and
people like him, if there are any. I did care what he thought, that is
until I saw he was as mad as anything on the subject. It was too silly.
I tell you what, though, I'd value your opinion!" And he came to another
stop and confronted me again, but this time such a picture of boyish
impulse and of innocent trust in me (even by that faint light) that I
was myself strongly inclined to be honest with him on the spot. But I
only smiled and shook my head.

"Oh, no, you wouldn't," I assured him.

"But I tell you I would!" he cried. "Do _you_ think there's any harm in
my going about with Mrs. Lascelles because I rather like her and she
rather likes me? I won't condescend to give you my word that I mean
none."

What answer could I give? His charming frankness quite disarmed me, and
the more completely because I felt that a dignified reticence would have
been yet more characteristic of this clean, sweet youth, with his noble
unconsciousness alike of evil and of evil speaking. I told him the
truth--that there could be no harm at all with such a fellow as himself.
And he wrung my hand until he hurt it; but the physical pain was a
relief.

Never can I remember going up to bed with a better opinion of another
person, or a worse one of myself. How could I go on with my thrice
detestable undertaking? Now that I was so sure of him, why should I even
think of it for another moment? Why not go back to London and tell his
mother that her early confidence had not been misplaced, that the lad
did know how to take care of himself, and better still of any woman whom
he chose to honour with his bright, pure-hearted friendship? All this I
felt as strongly as any conviction I have ever held. Why, then, could I
not write it at once to Catherine in as many words?

Strange how one forgets, how I had forgotten in half an hour! The reason
came home to me on the stairs, and for the second