"No, James, I won't, if you will only raise my intellect to the level of your own. And think what a delightful existence it will be, James. A cheap Bayswater dungeon, with three servants and the shopping done at Whiteley's. I'll turn my dresses and trim my hats and you'll give up your clubs, to curse in a stuffy drawing-room while you play bezique with your dear wife, till we go to bed at ten. No more betting on Podaskas, James; no more whist-drives, or bridge, or any such expensive naughtinesses. And how nice it will be for you, James, to flirt with those earnestly-fashionable suburban girls, who are just half an hour behind the times, and who----" Here Jim rent his garments from Leah's grasp, and departed in haste with an impolite word. His wife's humour did not appeal to him in the least, and he banged the door unnecessarily hard. Leah returned to warm her toes and laugh till she cried. There was something excessively amusing in the idea of Jim setting up for a plaster saint. For once in his dull life he displayed a sense of humour, and she picked up the discarded novel with a fresh burst of laughter at the picture of the Bayswater ménage, as drawn by her fertile fancy. Jim as a middle-class Philistine tickled her even more than Jim in a stained-glass attitude, with an artificial halo misfitting his empty head. But a remembrance of the cheque--payable to Jim--and of her husband's possible position at the moment, telling clumsy truths to an aggrieved father, made her serious. Certainly the Duke, pleased to hear his son speak honestly for once in a life of consistent fibbing, might shed tears over a hastily-produced cheque-book. Jim's falsehoods, in times of pressing need, were almost inspired, and it was not impossible that he might return with the loot. Then, the tradespeople being paid, Leah decided that she could run up fresh bills to any amount: they would be all the more eager to give her unlimited credit when they knew that the Duke was in the background. Decidedly the prospect was not so bad, and, after all, it might be dangerous to make real-life experiments in sensational fiction. These common-sense reflections led Lady Jim to thank the watchful fetish for governing her tongue during the afternoon. Demetrius could be nasty when he liked. She was certain of that, and it was just as well to give him no chance. Some people carried tyranny to a ridiculous excess, and liked to hear their victims squeal unmeaningly. Leah did not belong to the squealing species, and vowed a vow that Demetrius should never have an opportunity of provoking such futile outcries. As a gleam of good sense warned her of possible danger, she decided to avoid the Russian, or only to flirt sufficiently to make him miserable and Jim cross.