_Miss Ramsey_: "Well, never mind." She tosses her cigarette into the grate, and lights another. "I wonder why they always have cynical persons smoke, on the stage? I don't see that the two things necessarily go together, but it does give you a kind of thrill when they strike a match, and it lights up their faces when they put it to the cigarette. You know something good and wicked is going to happen." She puffs violently at her cigarette, and then suddenly flings it away and starts to her feet. "Will you--would you--open the window?" She collapses into her chair. _Ashley_, springing toward her: "Miss Ramsey, are you--you are ill!" _Miss Ramsey_: "No, no! The window! A little faint--it's so close-- There, it's all right now. Or it will be--when--I've had--another cigarette." She leans forward to take one; Ashley gravely watches her, but says nothing. She lights her cigarette, but, without smoking, throws it away. "Go on." _Ashley_: "I wasn't saying anything!" _Miss Ramsey_: "Oh, I forgot. And I don't know what we were talking about myself." She falls limply back into her chair and closes her eyes. _Ashley_: "Sha'n't I ring for the maid? I'm afraid--" _Miss Ramsey_, imperiously: "Not at all. Not on any account." Far less imperiously: "You may pour me a cup of tea if you like. That will make me well. The full strength, please." She motions away the hot-water jug with which he has proposed qualifying the cup of tea which he offers her. _Ashley_: "One lump or two?" _Miss Ramsey_: "Only one, thank you." She takes the cup. _Ashley_, offering the milk: "Cream?" _Miss Ramsey_: "A drop." He stands anxiously beside her while she takes a long draught and then gives back the cup. "That was perfect." _Ashley_: "Another?" _Miss Ramsey_: "No, that is just right. Now go on. Or, I forgot. You were not going on. Oh dear! How much better I feel. There must have been something poisonous in those cigarettes." _Ashley_: "Yes, there was tobacco." _Miss Ramsey_: "Oh, do you think it was the tobacco? Do throw the whole box into the fire! I shall tell Bob never to get cigarettes with tobacco in them after this. Won't you have one of the chocolates? Or a mallow? I feel as if I should never want to eat anything again. Where was I?" She rests her cheek against the side of her chair cushion, and speaks with closed eyes, in a weak murmur. Mr. Ashley watches her at first with anxiety, then with a gradual change of countenance until a gleam of intelligence steals into his look of compassion. _Ashley_: "You asked me to throw the cigarettes into the fire. But I want you to let me keep them." _Miss Ramsey_, with wide-flung eyes: "You? You said you wouldn't smoke." _Ashley_, laughing: "May I change my mind? One talks better." He lights a cigarette. "And, Miss Ramsey, I believe I _will_ have a cocktail, after all." _Miss Ramsey_: "Mr. Ashley!"