ere is very little good of
arguing the point much further. He has known Ted for eight years
without finding out that a certain bitter and Calvinistic penchant for
self-crucifixion is one of his ruling forces--and one of those least
easily deduced from his externals. Still he makes a last effort.

"Now don't start getting all tied up about that. Keep your mind on
Elinor."

"That's not--hard."

"Good--I see that you have all the proper reactions. And you'll excuse
me for saying that _I_ don't think she's too good for you--and even if
she were she'd have to marry somebody, you know--and when you put it,
put it straight, and let Paris and everything else you're worrying about
go plumb to hell! And that's good advice."

"I know it. I'll tell you of course."

"Well, I should _think_ you would!"

Oliver looks at his watch. "Great Scott--they'll be unmasking in twenty
minutes. And I've got to go back and cut Juliet out of the herd and take
her to supper--"

They rise and look at each other. Then

"Hope this is the last time, Ted, old fel--which isn't any reflection on
the last eight years odd," says Oliver slowly, and their hands grip once
and hard. Then they both start talking fast as they walk back to the
house to cover the unworthy emotion. But just as they are going in the
door, Oliver hisses into Ted's ear, an advisory whisper,

"Now go and eat all the supper you can, you idiot--it always helps."

XXXI

The parti-colored harlequin and the young Chinese lady in blue silks are
walking the Italian gardens, talking about nothing in particular.
Ted has managed to discuss the moon--it is high now, a round white
lustre--the night, which is warm--the art of garden decoration, French,
English and Italian--the pleasantness of Southampton after New York--all
with great nervous fluency but so completely as if he had met Elinor for
the first time ten minutes ago that she is beginning to wonder why,
if he dislikes her as much as that, he ever suggested leaving the
dance-floor at all.

Ted, meanwhile, is frantically conscious of the fact that they have
reached the end of the garden, are turning back, and still he is so
cripplingly tongue-tied about the only thing he really wishes to say
that he cannot even get the words out to suggest their sitting down. It
is not until he stumbles over a pebble while passing a small hard marble
seat set back in a nest of hedge that he manages to make his first
useful remark of the