er wifely things--if my mind does not deceive
me--that you wished me well out of your life, and Lady Swansdown with
me."

"That is a direct and most malicious misapplication of my words," says
she, emphatically.

"Is it? I confess that was my reading of them. I accepted that version,
and thinking to do you a good turn, and relieve you of both your _betes
noire_ at once, I proposed to Lady Swansdown last night that she should
accompany me upon my endless travels."

There is a long, long pause, during which Lady Baltimore's face seems to
have grown into marble. She takes a step forward now. Through the stern
pallor of her skin her large eyes seem to gleam like fire.

"How dare you!" she says in a voice very low but so intense that it
rings through the room. "How dare you tell me of this! Are you lost to
all shame? You and she to go--to go away together! It is only what I
have been anticipating for months. I could see how it was with you. But
that you should have the insolence to stand before me--" she grows
almost magnificent in her wrath--"and declare your infamy aloud! Such a
thought was beyond me. There was a time when I would have thought it
beyond you!"

"Was there?" says he. He laughs aloud.

"There, there, there!" says she, with a rather wild sort of sigh. "Why
should I waste a single emotion upon you. Let me take you calmly,
casually. Come--come now." It is the saddest thing in the world to see
how she treads down the passionate, most natural uprisings within her
against the injustice of life: "Make me at least _au courant_ with your
movements, you and she will go--where?"

"To the devil, you thought, didn't you?" says he. "Well, you will be
disappointed as far as she is concerned. I maybe going. It appears she
doesn't think it worth while to accompany me there or anywhere else."

"You mean that she refused to go with you?"

"In the very baldest language, I assure you. It left nothing to be
desired, believe me, in the matter of lucidity. 'No,' she would not go
with me. You see there is not only one, but two women in the world who
regard me as being utterly without charm."

"I commiserate you!" says she, with a bitter sneer. "If, after all your
attention to her, your friend has proved faithless, I----"

"Don't waste your pity," says he, interrupting her rather rudely. "On
the whole, the decision of my 'friend,' as you call her, was rather a
relief to me than otherwise. I felt it my duty to deprive you