Leila had been so queer that he had taken leave
immediately after supper. She had refused to talk about Noel; had even
seemed angry when he had tried to. How extraordinary some women were!
Did they think that a man could hear of a thing like that about such
a dainty young creature without being upset! It was the most perfectly
damnable news! What on earth would she do--poor little fairy princess!
Down had come her house of cards with a vengeance! The whole of her
life--the whole of her life! With her bringing-up and her father and
all--it seemed inconceivable that she could ever survive it. And Leila
had been almost callous about the monstrous business. Women were hard to
each other! Bad enough, these things, when it was a simple working girl,
but this dainty, sheltered, beautiful child! No, it was altogether too
strong--too painful! And following an impulse which he could not resist,
he made his way to the old Square. But having reached the house, he
nearly went away again. While he stood hesitating with his hand on the
bell, a girl and a soldier passed, appearing as if by magic out of the
moonlit November mist, blurred and solid shapes embraced, then vanished
into it again, leaving the sound of footsteps. Fort jerked the bell.
He was shown into what seemed, to one coming out of that mist, to be a
brilliant, crowded room, though in truth there were but two lamps and
five people in it. They were sitting round the fire, talking, and
paused when he came in. When he had shaken hands with Pierson and been
introduced to "my daughter Gratian" and a man in khaki "my son-in-law
George Laird," to a tall thin-faced, foreign-looking man in a black
stock and seemingly no collar, he went up to Noel, who had risen from a
chair before the fire. 'No!' he thought, 'I've dreamed it, or Leila
has lied!' She was so perfectly the self-possessed, dainty maiden he
remembered. Even the feel of her hand was the same-warm and confident;
and sinking into a chair, he said: "Please go on, and let me chip in."

"We were quarrelling about the Universe, Captain Fort," said the man
in khaki; "delighted to have your help. I was just saying that
this particular world has no particular importance, no more than a
newspaper-seller would accord to it if it were completely destroyed
tomorrow--''Orrible catastrophe, total destruction of the world--six
o'clock edition-pyper!' I say that it will become again the nebula out
of which it was formed, and by friction