The full sunniness of his smile came back as he looked down into her earnest face, caressing her hand. "Dear little woman," he said; "are you sure you have got entirely over being fond of me?" "I couldn't get over being fond of you. You know it. That's what makes it hurt so." He raised her hand tenderly, and kissed it. Then he dropped it abruptly, and turned away. "You must get over it," he said, so brusquely that she started almost as if from a blow. She sank back into her seat, and pressed her handkerchief to her eyes, while he walked back to his chair and sat down with an air of bravado. "It's no use, Alice," he said, "I'm not worth a thought, and it isn't in me to--Well, the fact is that I know myself too well. I know that if I promised you to-night that to-morrow I'd begin better fashions, I'm not man enough to live up to it. I couldn't involve you in--Oh, don't, don't!" He broke off to turn to toy with some of the ornaments on the table. In a moment Alice had suppressed her sobs, and he spoke again, but without meeting her look. His voice was hard and flippant. "You see I have such a good time that I wouldn't give it up for the world. I think I'd better keep on as I'm going. The time makes us, and we have to abide by the fashion of the time." "If that is the way you feel," she said coldly, "it is I who have presumed on old friendship." He shrugged his shoulders, and laughed harshly. "We have both been a little unnecessarily tragic, it seems to me," was his rejoinder. "Love isn't for a poor man unless he'll take it on the half-shell without dressing; and I fancy neither of us would much care for it that way. My bank-account is a standing reason why I shouldn't marry anybody." "The sentiment does credit to Mr. Neligage's head if not to his heart," commented the sneering voice of Miss Wentstile, who at that moment came through the portières from the library. "I hope I don't intrude?" "Certainly not," Alice answered with spirit. "Mr. Neligage was giving me a lesson in the social economics of matrimony; but I knew before all he has to tell." "Then, my dear," her aunt said, "I trust he will excuse you. It is time we went to Mrs. Wilson's. I promised the Count that we would be there early." IX THE MISCHIEF OF A GENTLEMAN