Jack lit a cigarette. "She makes scenes," he said, "and they bore me. She made one last night." "What about?" "I don't know that it's worth repeating, really," he said. "Probably not, but you are going to tell me." He looked at her a moment with his thin eyebrows drawn together in a frown, hit his horse rather savagely for an imaginary stumble, and reined it in again more sharply than was necessary. "I don't the least like being dictated to, Mildred," he said. "Nobody adopts that tone with me--with any success, that is to say." She laughed. "Oh, my excellent friend," she said, "you really speak as if I was afraid of you. For goodness' sake, don't put on schoolmaster airs. You know perfectly well that doesn't go down. Don't hit your horse now; you are behaving like a sulky child that whips its doll. What was the scene about?" "Did you see the infernal manner in which she walked off with Jim Spencer last night, driving him home in her brougham and saying she was going to Blanche Devereux'? That was her way of getting quits with me." "Quits with you? What for?" "For a conversation I had with her after lunch yesterday. I told her that if she was seen about with Jim Spencer people would talk, and if they talked it was absurd for her to keep up the sort of attitude she maintains towards society in general, saying that we are both fools and knaves." Mildred made a gesture of despair. "The stupidity of men really exceeds all bounds," she said. "I beg your pardon, that is by the way. You were saying that she walked off with Jim last night. I suppose you commented on that too, did you?" He flushed angrily. "If she imagines she is going to make a fool of me before all the world, the sooner she learns her mistake the better," said he. "You said that to her?" asked Mildred in a tone in which "even despair was mild." "Of course I did, or rather, I asked her whether she really went to see Blanche. She saw what I meant all right." "You seem to imagine she is as great a fool as you," remarked Mildred. He turned half round on his horse. "I don't stand such language from any one," said he. "Oh, for God's sake don't be absurd! You stand exactly what language I choose to use to you. Is it really possible, Jack, that you don't see what a dangerous and foolish game you are playing? _Mon Dieu! mon Dieu!_ you are married to that pearl of a woman, and you think you can treat her like that. You aren't fit to tie her boot-laces, and----" "I have no intention of trying."