"Rot! That's all you know about it. I've seen them begin so nice and go right down, like a stone in a well. And they never come up again. Not they. No more'll you. D'you hear that?" "I shall hear you better if you speak lower." Cuckoo suddenly changed from a sort of frenzy to a violent calm. "You're different already," she said. "Can't I see it?" As if to emphasize her remark she approached her face quite close to his in the twilight. While they had been arguing a cloud had passed over the sun, and dimness increased in the little room. Both of them were still standing up, and now Cuckoo peered into Julian's eyes with almost hungry scrutiny. Her lips were still trembling with excitement and her mouth was contorted into a sideways grin, expressive of contemptuous knowledge of the descent of Julian's nature. She was a mere mask of passion, no doubt a ridiculous object enough, touzled, dishevelled and shaken with temper, as she leaned forward to get a better view of him. And Julian was both vexed and disgusted by her outbreak, and sick of a scene which, like all men, he ardently hated and would have given much to avoid. He faced her coldly, endeavouring to calm her by banishing every trace of excitement from his expression. And then, in the twilight of the dingy room, and in the twilight of her eyes, he saw the flame once more. A thin glint of sunshine found its way in from the street, and threw a shadow near them. Cuckoo's eyes emitted a greenish ray like a cat's, and in this ray the flame swam and flickered, cold and pale, and, Julian fancied, menacing. Perhaps, because he was already irritated and slightly strung up by Cuckoo's attack, he felt a sudden anger against the flame, almost as he might have felt a rage against a person. As he stared upon it, he could almost believe that it, too, had eyes, scrutinizing, upbraiding, condemning him, and that in the thin riband and shade of its fire there dwelt a heart to hate him for the dear sin to which, at last, he began to give himself. For the moment Cuckoo and the flame were as one, and for the moment he feared and hated them both. Abruptly he held up his hand to stop the further words that were fluttering on her thin and painted lips. "Hush!" he said, in a little hiss of protest against sound. For again, fighting with the anger, there was awe in his heart. There was something unusual in his expression which held her silent, a furtive horror and expectation which she did not understand. And while she waited, Julian turned suddenly, and left the room and the house. CHAPTER VI THE LADY OF THE FEATHERS LEARNS WISDOM