There was a sharp crack, and Basil held the stem of one of Nicholas's pipes in one hand, the bowl in the other; he had broken it in two. His fluent tongue, his flexible face, were under his control; but it seemed that his hands were not; they had shown thus blatantly the uncontrollable strain he felt. Alix winced away from it. She couldn't bear any more: he must go, quickly, before either of them broke anything else. He went, slipping as it were unnoticeably away, with 'Good-bye' unemphasised, half ashamed, sandwiched between fatuities about the pipe and comments on the future. 'It was an ugly pipe, wasn't it? Tell Sandomir I broke it for his sake, compelled by my artistic conscience; it'll be for his good in the end.... I'm sorry I've not seen him; but you'll say good-bye for me.... And to any of them at the shop.... Good-bye.... If we do get out to the East, we shall have a funny time in some ways, I fancy. I hear Salonika's a great place; glorious riviera climate. But less so inland; too much snow on the hills. Well, it can't be worse than France in winter, anyhow. I believe the Bulgars are very good-natured people to fight against; they aren't really a bit keen on this show.... Want to get back to till their fields....' His voice came from beyond the door. Then it shut, and muffled his steps running down wooden stairs. Alix let go her raft, and was submerged by the cold, engulfing seas. CHAPTER XIII ALIX, NICHOLAS, AND WEST 1 Nicholas, coming in ten minutes later, found Alix lying in his cane chair, limp and white and sick. 'My dear,' he said after a glance, 'you seem very ill. You prescribe, and I'll see if West has any in his medicine cupboard.' 'Sal-volatile, perhaps,' Alix murmured, and he went to find some. When he came back, she was sitting up, with a more pulled-together air. She sipped the sal-volatile, and gave him a dim, crooked smile. 'It's my feelings really, you know, not my body. It's only that I'm ... shocked to death.' Nicholas stood, short and square, with his back to the fire, looking down on her with his small, keen, observant eyes. 'What's shocked you?' 'Me myself,' said Alix, forcing an unconcerned grin. 'Alone I did it.' 'What on earth's the matter, Alix?' asked Nicholas after a pause. 'Or don't you want to talk about it?' It wasn't his experience of his sister, who he had always known of a certain exterior and cynical hardness where the emotions were concerned, that she ever wanted to 'talk about it.' But this evening she seemed queer, unlike herself, unstrung. 'Talking doesn't matter now,' said Alix, still swung between flippancy and tears. 'All the talking that matters is done already.... Basil has gone away, Nicky. He'll perhaps never come back.' 'Oh, he will. Basil does.' Nicholas looked away from her, down at the fire.