In the drawing-room, under cover of a sentimental song, sung by the
female cousin, I questioned his aunt on the subject.
"What's the matter with him?" I said. "Is he ill?"
The old lady chuckled.
"You'll be like that one day," she whispered gleefully.
"When," I asked, not unnaturally alarmed.
"When you're in love," she answered.
"Is HE in love?" I inquired after a pause.
"Can't you see he is?" she replied somewhat scornfully.
I was a young man, and interested in the question.
"Won't he ever eat any dinner till he's got over it?" I asked.
She looked round sharply at me, but apparently decided that I was
only foolish.
"You wait till your time comes," she answered, shaking her curls at
me. "You won't care much about your dinner--not if you are REALLY
in love."
In the night, about half-past eleven, I heard, as I thought,
footsteps in the passage, and creeping to the door and opening it I
saw the figure of my friend in dressing-gown and slippers,
vanishing down the stairs. My idea was that, his brain weakened by
trouble, he had developed sleep-walking tendencies. Partly out of
curiosity, partly to watch over him, I slipped on a pair of
trousers and followed him.
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