Gilray maintains that instead of playing "fool's tricks" like these ("fool's tricks!") I should have got up and gone at once to his rooms with my water-bottle.

What?
and disturbed my neighbors?
Besides, could I reasonably be expected to risk catching my death of cold for the sake of a wretched chrysanthemum?
One reads of men doing such things for young ladies who seek lilies in dangerous ponds or edelweiss on overhanging cliffs.

But Gilray was not my sweetheart, nor, I feel certain, any other person's.
I come now to the day prior to Gilray's return.

I had just reached the office when I remembered about the chrysanthemum.

It was my last chance.
If I watered it once I should be in a position to state that, whatever condition it might be in, I had certainly been watering it.