“That I cannot wish to renew that chance intercourse with you of long ago, under these different circumstances.

I am glad to believe you have repented and recovered yourself. I am glad to tell you so. I am glad that, thinking I deserve to be thanked, you have come to thank me. But our ways are different ways, none the less. You are wet, and you look weary. Will you drink something before you go?”

He had replaced his neckerchief loosely, and had stood, keenly observant of me, biting a long end of it. “I think,” he answered, still with the end at his mouth and still observant of me, “that I will drink (I thank you) afore I go.”

There was a tray ready on a side-table.