I think you know, with practice you'd come on quite a lot." After that the games were understood to be more or less in the form of lessons, which put Mr.Spillikins on a pedestal of superiority, and allowed any bad strokes on his part to be viewed as a form of indulgence.
Also, as the tennis was viewed in this light, it was Norah's part to pick up the balls at the net and throw them back to Mr.Spillikins.

He let her do this, not from rudeness, for it wasn't in him, but because in such a primeval place as Castel Casteggio the natural primitive relation of the sexes is bound to reassert itself.
But of love Mr.Spillikins never thought.

He had viewed it so eagerly and so often from a distance that when it stood here modestly at his very elbow he did not recognize its presence.

His mind had been fashioned, as it were, to connect love with something stunning and sensational, with Easter hats and harem skirts and the luxurious consciousness of the unattainable.
Even at that, there is no knowing what might have happened.

Tennis, in the chequered light of sun and shadow cast by summer leaves, is a dangerous game.