d "sleep it off." Towards evening, when she wished
to go to him, his man told her that he was still sleeping. She went to
bed herself without seeing him. The next morning again he sent word that
he felt better, but would not be up till after luncheon and wished to be
left quiet. This made her uneasy; she would have liked to go to him in
spite of his wish, but she dared not. Such intrusions only made him
furious.

As she had some shopping to do for the baby, she spent the early
afternoon in this manner. When she returned and went to her
writing-room, a gay little apartment looking out on the small garden,
she found Cecil lounging there in one of the easy-chairs. As soon as she
glanced at him she saw that he had what she called his "good" look--that
is, his face was quiet and rather pale, and his mouth and eyes gentle.
He gave a rather embarrassed smile as she entered, lifting one shoulder
slightly in a way he had when nervously self-conscious. She knew that he
was repentant for the way that he had behaved to her on Thursday
evening, and would tell her so.

She went up to him, laid one hand on his hair and kissed his forehead.
He put up his hand and patted hers softly.

"So you're all right again? I'm so glad," she said, taking a chair in
front of him. "I was worried about you yesterday."

"Yes. I had a devilish time," he said. As he spoke, he blew a cloud of
cigarette smoke that half veiled his face from her, and again he smiled
in that half-sheepish way. This smile always roused in Sophy a feeling
mingled of tenderness and irritation. She sat watching him smoke for a
few moments without saying anything more. He always seemed to her to
smoke feverishly, avidly, as if the cigarette were a sort of food and he
very hungry. His cigarettes were enormous, made to order for him. He
smoked without a holder, down to the very end. She thought that it must
be bad for him to smoke so fast, and such quantities of these huge
cigarettes. But she dared not say anything. A word only was sufficient
to throw him from a "good" mood into a "bad" one.

He broke the silence himself.

"I say, Daphne," he blurted suddenly. "I was a beast to you the other
night. Beg pardon."

Sophy looked at him consideringly without replying. Somehow this casual
apology roused anew all the feeling of outraged anger that she had then
felt. She hated, too, for him to call her "Daphne" on these occasions.
It seemed such a cheap sentimentality. He had given