From a frown she broke into a smile again, as she went on. “It was a miserable week—till we went. Both the boys avoided me whenever they could. Both have told me why since, but I don’t believe that either of them told me the truth. Arsenio said it was because he couldn’t trust himself not to make love to me, and he had practically promised that he wouldn’t. I think it was because he thought I would expect to be made love to (I did!), and he didn’t want to; he wasn’t in love with me then; besides he was afraid of Waldo. Waldo said it was because he was ashamed of himself. I daresay he was ashamed, but it was much more because he was in love with me, but was too proud to seem to compete with Arsenio. Whatever the reasons, the result was—triumph for Nina! She was invited over every day and all day. Both of them tried to keep with her—in order to avoid me. I wasn’t exactly jealous, because I knew that they really wanted to be with me—but for the complications. But I was exasperated to see that she thought—as, of course, she must—that she had cut me out. How her manner changed! Before this she had adored me—as younger girls do older ones sometimes; ‘Darling Lucinda!’ and so on! I’d noticed her trying to imitate me, and she used to ask where I got such pretty frocks. Now she patronized me, told me how I must wish I had a nice home (she knew I hadn’t) like Cragsfoot or Briarmount, and said what a pity it was my mother couldn’t give me more chances of riding, so that I could improve! She did ride much better than I—which made it worse.” Here I looked at Lucinda, asking leave to laugh. She gave it in her own low-murmuring laughter at herself. “So it ended. We went away, and I was very glad when we did. I went away without either Arsenio or Waldo having said to me a single word that mattered.” “I must have been very dull to have noticed nothing—except just the quarrel; well, the quarrel itself, and how you looked while it was going on—till you were sent to bed.” “How did I look?” “Just as you did when I saw you in the taxi at the corner by Marlborough House.” “I’m very glad I didn’t see you! You’d have brought back what I’d managed to put out of my mind. As though I could put it out of my life!” Suddenly and abruptly she pushed her chair back from the table. “Aren’t we staying here a frightfully long time? That waiter’s staring at us.” “But surely I haven’t heard all the story yet?” “All the story? No. Only the prologue. And the prologue’s a comedy, isn’t it? A children’s comedy! The rest isn’t quite like that. Pay the bill and let’s go. For a walk, if you like—and have time.” “I ought just to call at my hotel—the _Méditerranée_—and see if there’s anything for me—any telegrams. If there aren’t, I should like to sit by the sea, and smoke, and hear the next chapter.” At the moment Lucinda merely nodded. But as we walked away, she put her arm in mine and said, “The next chapter is called ‘Venice,’ and it’s rather a difficult one for me to tell.”