"Then don't you, with your opportunities, know?" I was conscious of
rather an inspiration, a part of which was to be jocose. "What are you
trying," I laughed, "to get out of me?"
It struck me luckily that, though he remained as proof against gaiety as
ever, he was, thanks to his preoccupation, not disagreeably affected by
my tone. "Of course if you've no idea, I can get nothing."
"No idea of what?"
Then it was that I at last got it straight. "Well, of what's the matter
with her."
"Is there anything particular? If there _is_," I went on, "there's
something that I've got out of _you_!"
"How so, if you don't know what it is?"
"Do you mean if you yourself don't?" But without detaining him on this,
"Of what in especial do the signs," I asked, "consist?"
"Well, of everyone's thinking so--that there's something or other."
This again struck me, but it struck me too much. "Oh, everyone's a
fool!"
He saw, in his queer wan way, how it had done so. "Then you _have_ your
own idea?"
I daresay my smile at him, while I waited, showed a discomfort. "Do you
mean people are talking about her?"