The other women kissed Mrs. Balfame, straightened her hat, and escorted her out to the runabout which Dr. Anna brought to the rear entrance of the clubhouse. She smiled wearily at the group, touching her brow with a finger. As soon as the little car had left the grounds and was beyond the reach of peering eyes, she made no further attempt at self-control, but poured forth her inmost soul to the one person she had ever fully trusted. She told the doctor all the secret horror of her life, her hatred and loathing of David Balfame; everything, in short, but her determination to kill him, which in the novel excitement that had invaded her nervous system, she forgot. Dr. Anna, who had heard many such confessions, but who obstinately had hoped that her friend's case was not as bad as it appeared superficially, was glad that she was not driving a horse; humane as she was, she should have forgotten herself and lashed him to relieve her own feelings. "You must get a divorce," she said through her teeth. "You really must. I saw Rush looking at you. There is no mistaking that expression in a man's eyes. You must--you must divorce that brute." "I'll not!" Mrs. Balfame's composure returned abruptly. "And please forget that I gave way like this and--and said things." She wondered what she really had said. "I know I need not ask you never to mention it. But divorce! Oh, no. If I continue to live with him they'll be sorry for me and stand by me, but if I divorced him--well, I'd just be one more divorced woman and nothing more. Elsinore isn't Newport. Moreover, they'd feel I'd no further need of their sympathy. In time they'd let me pretty well alone." "I don't think much of your arguments," said Dr. Anna. "You could marry Rush and go to New York." "But you know I mean what I say. And don't worry, Anna dear." She bent over the astonished doctor and gave her a warm kiss. "And as I'm not demonstrative, you know I mean that too. You are not to worry about me. I've got the excuse I needed, and I'm going to buy some things at second hand and refurnish one of the old bedrooms and live in it. He can't say a word after this, and he'll be humble enough, for the men will make him apologise to the Club. I'll threaten him with divorce, and that alone will make him behave himself, for it would cost him a good deal more to pay me alimony than to keep the old house going--" "That isn't an argument that will have much effect on a man, usually in liquor. But women are queer cattle. Divorce is a great and beneficent institution, and here you elect to go on living under the same roof with a brute--Oh, well, it's your own funeral. Here we are. I've got to speed up and practise medicine. Am expecting a call from out at Houston's any minute. Baby. Good night." CHAPTER VI Mrs. Balfame let herself into the dark house. Saturday was Frieda's night out.