“Get up and go away!” she said, but it had no effect. There he lay, breathing heavily through his mouth, flushed, oddly serious in his expression, like a weary victor in some mighty struggle. Frances gave way to a sort of frenzy. “I can’t have two of you!” she cried. Recklessly she opened the door of Miss Eppendorfer’s room, found her also sound asleep, not to be wakened. She revolted utterly then, locked herself into her own little room, careless of what might happen to those others. For the first time in her life she remained awake all night. Early in the morning, before it was quite light, she slipped into the kitchen to make tea, and then went again to wake Lionel. This time it was not so hard. She gave him a cup of tea, stood in stony silence while he gulped it down, handed him his hat and overcoat, and firmly pushed him, dazed and passive, out of the door. III Miss Eppendorfer remained in bed until noon; she was “better” she said, but exhausted and listless. Frances was inordinately busy. She typed page after page of the authoress’s manuscript, and when there was absolutely no more to copy, set to work cleaning the table silver. She did not wish to think. It was the end of the world. Nothing ahead, nothing she could endure to contemplate. She hated Miss Eppendorfer because Lionel had been drunk. It was an illogical and unjust feeling, but she couldn’t repress it. She kept away from her as much as possible. She was very thankful to see her go out, arm in arm, with her cousin Kurt, to a concert for which she had bought tickets for a fabulous price. She thought she would go out herself, perhaps to church; she had begun to get ready, in fact, when Lionel arrived. Lionel exactly the same, nonchalant, superior, not a trace even of fatigue---- “The hall-boy told me Miss E. and the German chap had gone out, so I thought I’d come up,” he said. Frances was frigidly silent. “I owe you an explanation,” he went on, “only--I haven’t any. I ... had an awful row with Horace, and it knocked me up, and I ... tried to--more or less--forget it.” “No doubt you succeeded.” She spoke with cold precision, like a school teacher to a prejudged culprit; and he, acknowledging her claims as he always did, forced himself to explain. It was wretched for him, an almost intolerable humiliation to be called to account in this way; he was ashamed of himself, and he longed passionately to drop the subject forever. But Frances was the woman who had promised to marry him, and he felt he owed it to her. “You see, he was offended.... He thought--wanted me to be more--gradual. Stop on in his office, at least. And in the end, we quarrelled. I told him I wouldn’t take anything more from him--all that you advised, and so forth. And he--but what’s the use in repeating all that? It’s the first row we’ve ever had.”