u see, you're a
very important person, Derek."

Derek sat clutching the arms of his chair. His face was chalky. Though
he had never been inclined to underestimate his importance as a figure
in the public eye, he had overlooked the disadvantages connected with
such an eminence. He gurgled wordlessly. He had been prepared to brave
Lady Underhill's wrath and assert his right to marry whom he pleased,
but this was different.

Jill watched him curiously and with a certain pity. It was so easy to
read what was passing in his mind. She wondered what he would say, how
he would flounder out of his unfortunate position. She had no
illusions about him now. She did not even contemplate the possibility
of chivalry winning the battle which was going on within him.

"It would be very awkward, wouldn't it?" she said.

And then pity had its way with Jill. He had treated her badly; for a
time she had thought that he had crushed all the heart out of her: but
he was suffering, and she hated to see anybody suffer.

"Besides," she said, "I'm engaged to somebody else."

As a suffocating man, his lips to the tube of oxygen, gradually comes
back to life, Derek revived--slowly as the meaning of her words sank
into his mind, then with a sudden abruptness.

"What?" he cried.

"I'm going to marry somebody else. A man named Wally Mason."

Derek swallowed. The chalky look died out of his face, and he flushed
hotly. His eyes, half relieved, half indignant, glowed under their
pent-house of eyebrow. He sat for a moment in silence.

"I think you might have told me before!" he said huffily.

Jill laughed.

"Yes, I suppose I ought to have told you before."

"Leading me on...!"

Jill patted him on the arm.

"Never mind, Derek! It's all over now. And it was great fun, wasn't
it!"

"Fun!"

"Shall we go and dance? The music is just starting."

"I _won't_ dance!"

Jill got up.

"I must," she said. "I'm so happy I can't keep still. Well, good-bye,
Derek, in case I don't see you again. It was nice meeting after all
this time. You haven't altered a bit!"

Derek watched her flit down the aisle, saw her jump up the little
ladder on to the stage, watched her vanish into the swirl of the
dance. He reached for a cigarette, opened his case, and found it
empty. He uttered a mirthless, Byronic laugh. The thing seemed to him
symbolic.

III

Not having a cigarette of his own, Derek got up and went to look for
the only man he knew who could