“On the grounds that people are talking--and that you are my wife.” She looked full at him and he felt, rather than saw, the scorn in her face. “Do you remember,” she said at last, “my surprise when, without consulting me, you asked Dick Mayne to the house?” “When I trusted my wife,” he began, feeling that the confidence was fading out of his voice. “I thought she would have sufficient regard for my----” His words were cut short by her bitter laugh. “Oh, Robert! Are you really going to talk about your honor? That will be very funny.” A fury, fanned to white heat by the mockery of her tone, seized Robert. While he was struggling for words the hansom drew up before Lady Wilmot’s door, and without his aid Cecily alighted and moved before him up the steps and into the house. * * * * * Lady Wilmot’s big drawing-room was filled to overflowing when the Kingslakes entered. Their hostess pounced at once upon Cecily, and extended a casual hand to her husband. “Here you are, my dear! I thought you were never coming! There are a hundred people languishing for a sight of you. Here’s Mr. Fairholt-Graeme. I introduce him first, because his is a bad case, but he mustn’t monopolize you long.” Cecily smiled as a tall, grave-looking man took her hand with an air of homage, and in a few moments she was surrounded by a little knot of men and women, all eager for a word with her. Robert glanced round the room in search of Philippa. He caught a glimpse of her at last, on the broad landing outside the drawing-room. Some man was bending over her. Impatiently Robert struggled towards the door to see who it was, and presently discovered, as he suspected, Nevern. He clenched his hands. How he hated this kind of thing; hated the glaring lights, the parrot chatter, the crush, the heat, the sight of familiar faces. Some of them were smiling invitations, and he had to go and exchange _badinage_; to listen to repeated congratulations on Cecily’s success; to invent fresh sentences to express his rapture. Above the heads of the crowd, presently, he saw Mayne, and with the recognition of his face, came an intolerable stab of anger, of jealousy. He watched; saw him steadily draw near to Cecily, saw him wait quietly, without impatience, till he could speak to her; saw him move aside with her to an open window, where they stood together talking. In the meantime, unnoticed by him, Philippa was casting uneasy glances in his direction. From her seat on the landing, she could watch his face as he leaned in the doorway of the drawing-room, carrying on a desultory conversation with a pretty, fluffy-haired woman, who looked more than a little bored. Robert’s moods, as indicated by his expression, were too well known to Philippa to prevent her from misreading danger signals. She knew that she must get rid of Nevern. “I think you ought to go, Nigel,” she murmured, caressingly. “Yes, dear, please, I wish it. You have been talking to me too long.”