However, this morning Mr. Hobhouse felt braver, and stepped out briskly,
resolved to do his bit.
As he approached the house, the front door opened and the very lady
herself appeared. She carried a stick and was evidently setting forth
on a walk.
"This is very nice of you to come so soon, Mr. Hobhouse," she said. "I am
glad I hadn't gone further before you appeared."
"Oh, but don't let me stop you, Miss Rendall," said Mr. Hobhouse
anxiously. "Really, I can't allow it; no, no, really not. You mustn't
turn back, indeed you mustn't! Perhaps I shall find Mr. Rendall at home."
"I was only going for a walk to nowhere in particular." She looked at
him with an irresistible mixture of coyness and frankness and
suggested, "Would you care to come for a little walk too? It's far too
early for tea."
What could the poor gentleman do? He gushed over the suggestion of
course, and accepted it.
"I was going to walk down to the shore," she said. "Will that suit you?"
Mr. Hobhouse assured her that anywhere would suit him; he had no choice
at all: anywhere, everywhere, nowhere would be all the same to him.
As they walked side by side down towards the sea, he was suddenly struck
with the sense of being in a familiar situation, of a repetition of
something that had happened before. And then he realised that this was
actually the walk that the same girl and a young man Merton had taken on
a memorable August night.
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