His flush, his
decorative eyes, his dark eyebrows and eyelashes, his sleek, light brown
hair, would have made him vulgar. As it was, his queerness gave them a
sort of point.

I dwell on these physical details because, afterwards, I found myself
continually looking at him as if to see where his charm lay. To see, I
suppose, what _she_ saw in him.

If anybody had asked me that night what I saw in him myself beyond an
ordinary little journalist "on the make," I don't suppose I could have
told them. But there's no doubt that I felt his charm, or that night
would have been the end instead of the beginning.

We sat in the restaurant when he had done telling me about himself; I
remember we sat quite a long time discussing an English writer--our
contemporary--whom I rather considered I had discovered. In those days I
used to apply him as an infallible test. Jevons had read every word of
him; it was he, in fact, who brought him into the conversation. He
confessed afterwards that he had done it on purpose. He had been testing
_me_.

Even so our acquaintance might have lapsed but for the thing that
happened when the waiter came up with the bill. My share of it was three
and twopence, and I found myself with only ninepence in my pocket. I had
to borrow half a crown, from Jevons. You mayn't see anything very
dreadful in that. I didn't at the time, and there wasn't. The dreadful
thing was that I forgot to pay him back.

Yes. Something happened that put Jevons and his half-crown out of my head
for long enough. I forgot to pay him, and he had to go without his dinner
for three nights in consequence. It was his last half-crown.

He told me this as an immense joke, long afterwards.

And Viola Thesiger cried.

That crying of hers, that child-like softening and breaking down under
him, in itself so unexpected (I didn't know she could do it), that
sudden and innocent catastrophe, was the first sign to me that I was done
for--wiped out. There wasn't any violence or any hysteria about it, only
grief, only pity. It was an entirely simple, gentle and beautiful
performance, and it took place in my rooms after Jevons had left us. But,
as I say, this was long afterwards. The agony of my undoing was a
horribly protracted affair.

I needn't say that what happened--I mean the thing that made me forget
all about Jevons and his half-crown--was Viola Thesiger.

I had his address, but the next day--the day after the match--was Sunday,
so I c