Page:An adventure (1911).pdf/128

 as we had first talked about are constantly being repeated to us; some with the little additions we can recognise as our own early surmises; generally with the omission of points we did not know to be interesting until later; and often with all the muddles arising from the attempt to shorten a long story, with a few unauthorised additions and explanations thrown in. These stories are told to us as being the property of persons we have never heard of. We have constantly enquired on what authority they rest, and, if there is any at all, we have not infrequently been able to discover the track they have followed from us back to us again.

17. We do not think that deception explains it. If we were deceived in one, two, or three points, could we have been in all? For out of them we have been able to reconstruct the story of Trianon in many tiny details, the truth of which we have had to discover for ourselves.

18. We are constantly asked why we, of all people, should have had such an adventure? We are equally puzzled; and have come to think that it may not be so unusual as it seems. We can imagine that people, even if they suspected anything unusual (which they might