e more, and that the men would sit about
smoking on the davenport and the taborets, and that every one would be
pleasantly quiet. But Lucille did not. Instead, she and Francis
retired to the back room, leaving Marjorie and the others to amuse each
other, and talk for what seemed to Marjorie's strained nerves an
eternity of time. It was Francis who had called Lucille, moreover, and
not Lucille who had summoned Francis, as could have been expected.

Finally the other men rose to go. Francis came out of the inner room
and went with them. Before he went he stopped to say to Marjorie:

"I told you I wanted to talk things over with you. I'll be back in a
half-hour. You seem to be so popular that the only way to see you
alone is to get you in a motor-car, so if you aren't too tired to drive
around with me to-night, to a place where I have to go, I'll bring you
home safely. . . . I didn't mean to speak so sharply to you, Marjorie,
over the telephone. Please forgive me."

"Certainly," said Marjorie coldly and tremulously. It could be seen
that she did not forgive him in the least.

He went downstairs with the others, laughing with Burke, who had a
dozen army reminiscences to exchange with him, and bidding as small a
good-by as decency permitted to Logan. Marjorie heard him dash up
again, and then run down, as if he had left something outside the door
and forgotten it. Lucille came over to her and began to fuss at her
about changing her frock for a heavier one, and taking enough wraps.

"Why, it's only a short drive," Marjorie expostulated. "And I'm not
sure that I want to go, anyway. I don't think there's anything more to
be said than we have said."

Francis, with that disconcerting swiftness which he possessed, had come
back as she spoke.

He came close to her, and spoke softly.

"You used to like the boy you married, Marjorie. For his sake won't
you do this one thing? Give me a hearing--one more hearing."

Lucille had come back again with a big loose coat, and she was wrapping
it round her friend with a finality that meant more struggle than poor
tired Marjorie was capable of making. After all, another half-hour of
discussion would not matter. The end would be the same. She went down
with them to the big car that stood outside, and even managed to say
something flippant about its looking like a traveling house, it was so
big. Francis established her in the front seat, by him, tucked a rug
around h