I felt proud of him, conscious that to the making
of him I had to some small degree contributed.
"You must come out and lunch with Maisie and me one day this week," said
he. "She would love to see you."
"Wait till you're married," said I, "and then we'll consider it. At
present Maisie is under the social dominion of her parents."
"Well--what of it?"
"Just that," said I.
Then the truth dawned on him. He grew excited and said it was damnable.
He wasn't going to stand by and see people believe a lot of scandalous
lies about me. He had no idea people had given me the cold shoulder. He
would jolly well (such were his words) take a something (I forget the
adjective) megaphone and trumpet about society what a splendid fellow I
was.
"I'll tell everybody the whole silly-ass story about myself from
beginning to end," he declared.
I checked him. "You're very generous, my dear boy," said I, "but you'll
do me a favour by letting folks believe what they like." And then I
explained, as delicately as I could, how his sudden championship could
be of little advantage to me, and might do him considerable harm.
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