diff --git a/include/qpdf/QPDFObjectHandle.hh b/include/qpdf/QPDFObjectHandle.hh
index b8787635..ae1a465b 100644
--- a/include/qpdf/QPDFObjectHandle.hh
+++ b/include/qpdf/QPDFObjectHandle.hh
@@ -1611,7 +1611,7 @@ class QPDFObjectHandle
     void typeWarning(char const* expected_type, std::string const& warning);
     void objectWarning(std::string const& warning);
     void assertType(char const* type_name, bool istype);
-    bool dereference();
+    inline bool dereference();
     void makeDirect(std::set<QPDFObjGen>& visited, bool stop_at_streams);
     void disconnect();
     void setParsedOffset(qpdf_offset_t offset);
diff --git a/libqpdf/QPDFObjectHandle.cc b/libqpdf/QPDFObjectHandle.cc
index 5457c68c..2b2ca5db 100644
--- a/libqpdf/QPDFObjectHandle.cc
+++ b/libqpdf/QPDFObjectHandle.cc
@@ -2525,7 +2525,7 @@ QPDFObjectHandle::assertPageObject()
     }
 }
 
-bool
+inline bool
 QPDFObjectHandle::dereference()
 {
     if (!isInitialized()) {