She smiled across at him. This sudden reversion to an easy every-day plane had brought Sansome's first mood again to the surface. In this atmosphere of orderly tête-à-tête he was again the society man. Nan breathed freer. He murmured something inane and conventional about Hebe. "Meaning you're a little tin god?" she chaffed. He said something still more involved, to the effect that her presence would make a god out of the most unworthy mortal. It was all vapid, unreal, elaborate, artificial. "If I can only keep him at this!" thought she desperately. She had drunk her glass of sherry because she felt she needed it. Now she poured another, and without comment, refilled Sansome's whiskey glass. "Here's to us!" she cried, lifting her glass. Nan's plan of getting him so drunk that he would not interfere with her escape had the merit of simplicity, and also of endorsement by such excellent authority as melodrama and the novel. It had the defect of being entirely theoretical. Nan's innocence of the matter in hand had not taken into account the intermediate stages of drunkenness, nor did she realize the strength inherent in the association of ideas. As she leaned forward to fill the glasses, Sansome's eyes brightened. He had seen women pouring wine many times before. The picture before him reminded him of a dozen similar pictures taken from the gallery of his rather disreputable past. His elaborate complimentary mood vanished. He pledged her ardently, and deep in his eyes began to burn a secret covetous flame. Nan poured her, sherry under the table. "This really is a cozy party!" she cried. "Will you have another with me?" The third glass of neat whiskey whirled in Sansome's head. He was verging toward complete drunkenness, but in the meantime became amorous. His eyes burned, his lips fell apart. Nan tried in desperation to keep on a plane of light persiflage, to hold him to his chair and to the impersonal. Deep fear entered her. She urged more drink on him, hoping that he would be overpowered. It was like a desperate race between this man's passions and the deep oblivion that reached for them. Her mouth was dry, and her brain whirled. Only by the greatest effort could she prevent herself from flying to pieces. Sansome hardly appeared to hear her. He wagged his head at her, looking upon her with swimming, benevolent eyes. Suddenly, without warning, he sprang up, overturning with a crash the small table and the bottles and glasses. "By God, you're the most beautiful woman I ever saw!" he cried. "Come here!" He advanced on her, his eyes alight. She saw that the crisis had come, and threw aside all pretence. "Keep away! Keep away!" she warned him through, gritted teeth; then, as he continued to stumble toward her, she struck at him viciously again and again with one of the small light chairs. For a moment or so she actually managed to beat him off; but he lunged through the blows and seized her around the shoulders.