Darlington turned quickly from the window, whither he had strolled after their greeting. He uttered a sharp, half-suppressed exclamation. ‘Left him?’ he said. ‘You don’t mean----’ His interrogative glance completed the sentence. There was something in his eyes, something stern and businesslike, that made Haidee afraid. Her own eyes turned elsewhere. ‘Yes,’ she said. Darlington put his hands in his pockets and came and stood in front of her. He looked down at her as if she had been a child out of whom he wished to extract some information. ‘Quarrelling, eh?’ he said. ‘No, not quarrelling at all,’ she answered. ‘Then--what?’ ‘He has spent all the money,’ she said, ‘and lots beside, and he is going to sell everything in the house in order to pay you, and then he wanted me to go and live cheaply--_cheaply_, you understand?--in Italy; and--and he said I must sell my diamonds.’ ‘Did he?’ said Darlington. ‘And he is going to sell everything in order to pay me, is he? Well, that’s honest; I didn’t think he’d the pluck. He’s evidently not quite such an utter fool as I’ve always thought him. Well?’ ‘And, of course, I left him.’ ‘That “of course” is good. Of course, being you, you did, “of course.” Yes, I understand that part, Haidee. But’--he looked around him with an expressive glance at her surroundings, ‘why--here?’ he inquired sharply. ‘I came to you,’ she said in a low and not too confident voice. Darlington laughed--a low, satirical, cynical laughter that frightened her. She glanced at him timidly; she had never known him like that before. ‘I see!’ he said. ‘You thought that I should prove a refuge for the fugitive wife? But I’m afraid that I am not disposed to welcome refugees of any description--it isn’t my _métier_, you know.’ Haidee looked at him in astonishment. Her eyes caught and held his: he saw the growing terror in her face. ‘But----’ she said, and came to a stop. Then she repeated the word, still staring at him with questioning eyes. Darlington tore himself away with a snarl.