midnight.
Cosgrave himself was drunk--less with wine than with a kind of heady
exhilaration that made him in turn maudlingly sentimental or recklessly
hilarious. And yet there was a definite and serious purpose in his
coming--a rather pathetic desire to "put himself right," to get
Stonehouse, who leant against the mantleshelf watching him with a frank
contempt, to understand and sympathise.

"Of course--you're mad with me--you've got every right to be--it was a
rotten thing to do--bolting like that--beastly ungrateful and
inconsiderate. It was just because I couldn't explain. I knew you
thought it was the fresh air and--and hunting down those poor jolly
little beggars--and all the time it was just a girl and a blessed tune
running through my head."

He began to hum, beating time with tipsy solemnity, and even then the
wretched song brought something riotous and headlong into the subdued
room.

The door seemed to have been flung violently open with an explosive
gesture, as though some invisible showman had called out: "Look who's
here!" and the woman herself had catherine-wheeled into their midst,
standing there in her exotic gorgeousness, with her arms spread out in
salutation and her mouth parted in that rather simple smile. Robert
could almost smell the faint perfume that surrounded her like a cloud.
It was ridiculous--yet for the moment she was so real, that he could
have taken her by the shoulders and thrust her out.

"And you did want me to get better, didn't you?" Cosgrave pleaded
wistfully, "even if it wasn't with your medicine. And in a sort of way
it was your medicine, wasn't it? You made me go to see her."

Stonehouse had to sit down and pretend to rearrange his papers in order
to hide how impatient he felt.

"My professional vanity isn't wounded, if that's what you're getting
at. If you were better I'd be very glad. As far as I can see you're
only drunk."

"I know--a little--I'm not accustomed to it--but it's not that, Robert.
Really, it isn't. I'm jolly all--the time--even in the early morning.
Seem to have come back to life from a beastly long way off--all at
once--by special aeroplane. I don't think I've felt like this
since--since----"

"Since Connie Edwards' day," Robert suggested. "But I expect you've
forgotten her."

Cosgrave stared, round-eyed and open-mouthed and foolish.

"Connie----? No--I haven't. You bet I haven't. Often wonder what
became of her. She was a jolly good