"Do you know," he asked, "I came here to-night just to kiss you. Only that! I didn't hope for any more satisfaction, but some day I shall have it. You're not what you think you are. And I'll make you very happy. As a looker-on I've seen a lot of the game called marriage, and I'd know _how_ to make you happy. Don't you believe it?" Released, she retreated to the other side of the room. "I don't want to believe it; you'd better go; you've behaved disgracefully, and I don't feel in the least like forgiving you." "Very well," said Rokeby, as Marie's footsteps sounded on the parquetry of the corridor, "I'm going, but I shall come again, and again! You won't get rid of me, I say, till you've married me. And then you'll never be rid of me." He swung round, laughing, and opened the door for Marie. "Now, Mrs. Kerr, I'm to see you well on your way home." She looked from one to the other, at Julia tall and flaming, and Desmond diffusing a kind of electricity. "I believe you two have been quarrelling; I ought not to have left you alone." "We have been quarrelling frightfully. Miss Winter is never going to allow me here again." "Glad you realise _that_," said Julia frostily. He went out into the hall goodhumouredly to find his coat and hat, and Marie's umbrella, while the two women kissed good-bye. The fold of kimono that covered Julia's bosom heaved rapidly and her eyes were very bright. She would not offer Rokeby her hand, but went to the front door with her arm round Marie's waist. They looked back to wave at her before they ran downstairs; she looked very tall and brilliant as she stood in her doorway, her head held high, and her mouth tightly set, and when the door had shut upon her, Marie wondered aloud: "What can have happened to annoy her so?" "I've done it," said Rokeby, "but don't worry over it. These things adjust themselves, and nothing matters at the moment, anyway, but seeing you safely home." "You can't come right out to Hampstead." "I can; and I should certainly like to, if I may. Osborn would never forgive me for leaving you at this time of night." She thought how kind he was, and how restful. It was attractive to be looked after again, deferred to and considered. Rokeby drove her the whole way out in a taxicab and found the sincerity of her thanks, as they parted, very touching. As for Marie, not for years had she climbed all those cold stairs so buoyantly; and after her long day, as she put her latchkey in the lock, she suddenly sensed the pleasure of coming home. There was nothing to do, in a rush, when she got in; no preparations to make, or food to cook; no setting forward of work for to-morrow, for the charwoman was coming early. A man was a man certainly, and a quality to miss, but without him there was a great still peace in the flat. Grannie Amber, blinking drowsily, came out of the dining-room to meet her daughter. She noted the bright eyes and cheeks, and her heart beat joyfully. "Had a nice time, duck?"