"I am not forgetting her. Fanny isn't going to mind as you think she minds. As you would mind yourself if you were in her place. Things don't go so deep with Fanny as all that.... And she isn't going to hold me against my will. She's not that sort.... Listen, now. Please listen." Barbara sat still, listening. She would let him go to the end of his tether. "I'll confess. In the beginning I hadn't thought of a divorce. I couldn't bear the idea of going through all that unpleasantness. But I'd go through it ten times over rather than that you should marry Ralph Bevan.... Wait now.... Before I spoke to you to-day I'd made up my mind to ask Fanny to divorce me. I know she'll do it. Your name shan't be allowed to appear. The moment I get her consent we'll go off together somewhere. Italy or the Riviera. I've got everything planned, everything ready. I saw to that when I was in London. I've bought everything--" She saw forked lightnings on a magenta Waddington. "What are you laughing at, Barbara?" He stood over her, distressed. Was _Barbara_ going to treat him to a fit of hysterics? "Don't laugh. Don't be silly, child." But Barbara went on laughing, with her face in the cushions, abandoned to her vision. From far up the park they heard the sound of Kimber's hooter, then the grinding of the car, with Fanny in it, on the gravel outside. Barbara sat up suddenly and dried her eyes. They stared at each other, the stare of accomplices. "Come, child," he said, "pull yourself together." Barbara got up and looked in the glass and saw the green jade necklace hanging on her still. She took it off and laid it on the table beside the forgotten sketch-book. "I think," she said, "you must have meant this for Mrs. Levitt. But you may thank your stars it's only me, this time." He pretended not to hear her, not to see the necklace, not to know that she was going from him. She stood a moment with her back to the door, facing him. It was her turn to stand there and be listened to. "Mr. Waddington," she said, "some people might think you wicked. I only think you funny." He drew himself up and looked noble. "Funny? If that's your idea of me, you had better marry Ralph Bevan." "I almost think I had." And she laughed again. Not Mrs. Levitt's laughter, gross with experience. He had borne that without much pain. Girl's laughter it was, young and innocent and pure, and ten times more cruel. "You don't know," she said, "you don't know how funny you are," and left him. Mr. Waddington took up the necklace and kissed it. He rubbed it against his cheek and kissed it. A slip of paper had fallen from the table to the floor. He knew what was written on it: "From Horatio Bysshe Waddington to his Little April Girl." He took it up and put it in his pocket. He took up the sketch-book.