"But I must. Why not?"

He hesitated, shifting from one foot to the other almost like a great
boy.

"I don't know what she's up to," he answered at last.

"Miss Schley?"

"Ah!"

Lady Holme felt her heart beat faster. Was her husband going to open up
a discussion of the thing that had been turning her life to gall during
these last weeks--his flirtation, his _liaison_--if it were a _liaison_;
she did not know--with the American? The woman who had begun to idealise
Fritz and the woman who was desperately jealous of him both seemed to be
quivering within her.

"Do you mean--?" she began.

She stopped, then spoke again in a quiet voice.

"Do you mean that you think Miss Schley is going to do something unusual
at the concert tomorrow?"

"I dunno. She's the devil."

There was a reluctant admiration in his voice, as there always is in
the voice of a man when he describes a woman as gifted with infernal
attributes, and this sound stung Lady Holme. It seemed to set that angel
upon whom she was calling in the dust, to make of that angel a puppet,
an impotent, even a contemptible thing.

"My dear Fritz," she said in a rather loud, clear voice, like the voice
of one speaking to a child, "my dear Fritz, you're surely aware that I
have been the subject of Miss Schley's talent ever since she arrived in
London?"

"You! What d'you mean?"

"You surely can't be so blind as not to have seen what all London has
seen?"

"What's all London seen?'

"Why, that Miss Schley's been mimicking me!"

"Mimickin' you!"

The brown of his large cheeks was invaded by red.

"But you have noticed it. I remember your speaking about it."

"Not I!" he exclaimed with energy.

"Yes. You spoke of the likeness between us, in expression, in ways of
looking and moving."

"That--I thought it was natural."

"You thought it was natural?"

There was a profound, if very bitter, compassion in her voice.

"Poor old boy!" she added.

Lord Holme looked desperately uncomfortable. His legs were in a most
violent, even a most pathetic commotion, and he tugged his moustache
with the fingers of both hands.

"Damned cheek!" he muttered. "Damned cheek!"

He turned suddenly as if he were going to stride about the room.

"Don't get angry," said his wife. "I never did."

He swung round and faced her.

"D'you mean you've always known she was mimickin' you?"

"Of course. From the very start."

His face got redder.

"I'll teach her to le