te account for.

Then Jevons explained it for me.

"The Kiddy's growing up," he said (he said it to himself). "She'll be
twenty to-morrow. She won't throw wet sponges at me any more."

That was it. Norah was growing up. Her soft face was setting and the
expression I had noticed had come to stay.

Presently Jevons got up. He said he had work to do.

"The Grand Attack, Furnival, the Grand Attack!"

And he left us together.

Norah looked after him.

"Poor little Jimmy," she said. "I don't think he ever did a _bad_ thing
in his life."

And then, with what seemed a daring irrelevance, "I wish Charlie wasn't
here. I can't think why Viola ever asked him."

"Why shouldn't she?"

"Because he's bad for Jimmy. He puts him in the wrong."

I'm afraid I laughed a little brutally at the extravagance of this.

"Well," she said. "I can't bear him to suffer."

"You've got a very tender little heart, haven't you?" I said.

"It isn't half as tender as Viola's. But I've got more common sense."

"Then why," I said, "did you laugh at Jimmy just now?"

"That's why. Because it was the best thing you could do. He doesn't mind
it half so much when you laugh at him. It's people looking down their
noses, like Charlie, that he minds. It must be awful for the poor little
chap, when you come to think of it, living on the edge, never knowing
when he's going to do something that'll make Viola's blood run cold."

"It must be still more awful for Viola."

To that she said, "It isn't. You don't know how Viola feels about Jimmy.
None of my people do. They simply don't understand it."

"Oh, come," I said, "they've accepted it, haven't they?"

"They've accepted it _because_ they don't understand her. They say they
never know what she'll do next, and Jimmy's come as a sort of relief to
them. They thought she might do something much worse. You see, she isn't
a bit like any of us. If she wants to do a thing she'll do it, no matter
what it is. She wanted to go to Bruges with Jimmy and look at the Belfry,
and she did it like a shot. What they can't see is that she'll never
_want_ to do anything wrong, so she'll never do it. They can't see that
there was just as much Belfry as Jimmy in it. There always will be a
Belfry in Viola's life, and when she hears the bells going she'll run off
to see. And Jimmy's the only man who'll ever take her to a Belfry.

"She's all right. Because she knows that Jimmy's really ten times more
refined than any o