Blanche watched him tremulously; she drew yet nearer. “Could we not still be friends?” she said, with a pathetic little quiver in her voice. “No,” he cried vehemently, yet with a certain dignity in his manner; “no, we could not.” Then, before Blanche could recover enough from her sense of humiliation at this rebuff to speak, he bowed to her and left the room. She threw herself down on the sofa and buried her face in the cushions. “Oh, what must he think of me? what must he think of me?” she sobbed. “How I wish I had written to him at once and saved myself this dreadful scene! How could I have been so silly! so dreadfully silly! To be afraid of writing a few words in a letter! My poor Viking! he looked so grand as he turned away. I wish we could have been friends still; it used to be so pleasant in Norway; he was so unlike other people; he interested me. And now it is all over, and I shall never be able to meet him again. Oh, I have managed very badly. If I had not been so imprudent on Munkeggen he might have been my cavalier all his life, and I should have liked to show him over here to people. I should have liked to initiate him in everything.” The clock on the mantel-piece struck five. She started up and ran across to one of the mirrors, looking anxiously at her eyes. “Oh, dear! oh, dear! what shall I do?” she thought. “Algernon will be here directly, and I have made a perfect object of myself with crying.” Then, as the door-bell rang, she caught up a couvrette, sunk down on the sofa, and covered herself up picturesquely. “There is nothing for it but a bad headache,” she said to herself. CHAPTER VI.