had been crying. But she did not sound as though she
had been crying. She sounded breathless and resentful.

"He heard this afternoon," she said. "And what must he do but come
bursting round to my place--half an hour before I'm due to start for the
show--and carry on like a madman. Scared stiff, I was. Tried to make me
swear I'd marry him and start for Timbuctoo to-morrow, and when I
wouldn't, wanted to shoot himself and me too--as though I'd made a muck
of things. Well, I'd done my best, and when it came to that sort of
sob-stuff I'd had enough. What's he take me for? Get me into trouble
with my landlady--making a row like that."

Robert heard her out in silence, and his intent, expressionless scrutiny
seemed to flick her on the raw. She stamped her foot at him. "Oh, for
the Lord's sake, get a move on---do something, can't you? I didn't come
here to be stared at as though I were a disease!"

"Where is he?"

"If I knew----! My place probably--with the gas full on--committing
suicide--making a rotten scandal. You've got to come and dig him out."

"Where do you live?"

"Ten minutes from here. 10E Stanton Place. I'll show you a short way.
I ran like a hare, hoping I'd catch you, and you'd put a bit of sense
into the poor looney's head. Serves me right--taking on with his sort."

"Well--we'd better hurry," Robert said.

"Thanks. I said I'd show you the way. I'm not coming in. Don't you
believe it. I've had enough. All I ask is--get him out and keep him
out."

"You're through with him?"

Her habitual good-natured gaiety was gone. She looked disrupted and
savagely afraid, like an animal that has escaped capture by a frantic
effort. And yet it was difficult to imagine Rufus Cosgrave capturing or
frightening anyone.

"You bet I'm through with him. You tell him so--tell him I don't want to
see him again--I won't be bothered----" She broke off, and added, with
a kind of rough relenting: "Put it any blessed way you like--say what's
true--we've had our good times together--and it seems they're over--we've
no use for one another."

"You mean--now he's failed."

"What do _you_ mean--'now he's failed'? What's his rotten old exam got
to do with me? I don't even know what it's about."

"You took the good time whilst you could get it, and now when you can't
hope for anything more----"

She stopped short, and they faced each other with an antagonism that
neither gave nor asked for quarter. T