"Of course you’re bound to say that for your own sake. Look here, Maggy, you needn’t tell me lies. I won’t swallow them. You know perfectly well that if I’d known he’d asked you down to his rotten place I’d have stopped your going." "I did think of that, Fred," she admitted; "but then I knew there was no harm in it, and if I hadn’t gone Lexie wouldn’t have been able to, either; and I wasn’t looking forward to spending Christmas alone here. No flesh and blood girl could resist a square invitation like that. Why didn’t you take me abroad with you if you couldn’t trust me? I haven’t asked you questions about where you’ve been or what you did while you were away. Besides, if it comes to that, husbands and wives often pay visits apart." "Do you consider yourself particularly qualified to give an opinion about the habits of married people?" he sneered. "That’s a caddish thing to fling in my face," she cried indignantly. Woolf flinched a little under her flashing eyes. "This quarrel’s getting vulgar," he retorted uneasily. "It’s of your making. Look me in the face, Fred, and you’ll see I couldn’t tell you a lie. Look at me, please." He did so reluctantly. "On my solemnest word of honor, on my awful love for you," she said with terrible earnestness, "I swear to you, Fred, that never once have I been unfaithful to you, even in thought." "Never seen Chalfont in town, I suppose?" It was a chance shot, but Woolf saw that it had struck home. "Oh, so you have!" he followed up quickly. "Well—upon my word! That means, before I went away." "Yes. You shan’t say I’m deceiving you. I went to him to borrow some diamonds for Lexie." The astonishing avowal staggered him. "That’s a pretty admission!" he laughed satirically. "Gentlemen are not in the habit of lending girls diamonds for nothing!" "Oh, what do you know what _gentlemen_ do?" she retorted, losing control of her temper. Had she deliberately tried to wound his self-esteem she could have chosen no better way. Inadvertently she had touched on the raw. Woolf would not have admitted it for the world, but deep down in his consciousness he knew that he was not a gentleman and had no pretensions to be called one. What galled him more than all was that Maggy, whose status would have been considered a grade lower than his own, must have detected the social difference between himself and a man like Chalfont. Accidentally she found the vulnerable chink in his armor of swagger and carefully acquired polish. "That will do," he said, getting up and flushing darkly. "It’s a bit too thick when a girl of your class sets up to criticise a man of mine. I’m not a gentleman? Very well, that ends it between you and me." The stark finality of his words and manner made her tremble all over. "You mean—Oh, my God, Fred, you can’t mean you’re done with me?" "That’s about it.... You’ve got nothing to complain of. You’ll be better off with Chalfont." She ran to him and held him.