"I'm not going away, Martin ... not until we've had a talk. Nothing can
make me. So there!"

He was looking at her again.

"Why, you've cut your hair!" he said.

"Yes." she said.

Then he turned roughly right round upon her as though he meant to end
the matter once and for all.

"Look here! ... I do mean what I say--" He was cut off then by a fit of
coughing. He leant back against the wall and fought with it, his hand
against his chest. She made no movement and said no word while the
attack lasted.

He gasped, recovering his breath, then, speaking in a voice lower than
before: "I mean what I say. I don't want you. I don't want any one.
There's nothing for us to say to one another. It's only waste of time."

"Yes," she answered. "That's your side of the question. There's also
mine. Once before you had your own way and I was very miserable about
it. Now it's my turn. I'm going to stay here until we've talked."

He turned, his face working angrily, upon her.

"You can't stay here. It's impossible. What do you do it for when I
tell you I don't want you? First my sister ... then you ... come here
spying. Well, now you're seen what it's like, haven't you? Very jolly,
isn't it? Very handsome? You'd better go away again, then. You've seen
all you've wanted to."

"I'm not going away," repeated Maggie, "I didn't come to spy. You know
that. Of course you can turn me out, but you'll have to use force."

"Oh, no, I won't," he answered. "There are other ways."

He disappeared into the other room. A moment later he returned; he was
wearing a soft black hat and a shabby grey overcoat.

"You'll get tired of waiting, I expect," he said, and, without looking
at her but just touching her arm as he brushed past her, he left the
room. She heard him descend the stairs. Then the street-door closed.

She sat down upon the shabby red sofa and looked about her. What a
horrible room! Its darkness was tainted with a creeping coldness that
seemed to steal in wavering gusts from wall to wall. The carpet was
faded to a nondescript colour and was gashed into torn strips near the
fireplace. No pictures were on the walls from which the wall-paper was
peeling. He had done nothing whatever to make it more habitable.

He must have been staying there for several weeks, and yet there were
no signs of any personal belongings. Nothing of himself to be seen!
Nothing! It was as though in the bitterness of his spirit he had said
that he would no