From what I knew of Sibyl I should say she at first took the breaking off of their relations very hardly.... "Agony, rage, despair" ... much pacing up and down the library.... Passionate letters half-written, then torn up into small fragments and thrown into the fire. Then—for she was a slave to her large household and magnificent mode of life—her maid Sophie enters the library and reminds My Lady that she is due that night to dine at the Italian Embassy. So Sibyl has to submit to be coiffed, dressed, jewelled, and driven off in a brougham—a little late, and that intrudes on her mind, because she has heard you should never be late to an Ambassador’s invitation, it is a sort of _lèse-majesté_. But to cope with the demands made on her, she has to force her heart-break to the back of her mind and sustain her reputation for gay beauty, daring expression, and alert wit—in French as well as English. There was a Royalty there to whom she had to curtsey and with whom she had to sustain a raillery, shot with malice, which required considerable brain-concentration; for though the retorts must call forth further bursts of laughter from the chorus that watched the duel, they must be free from the slightest impertinence. Roger’s abrupt leave-taking only remained like a dull ache behind her vivid consciousness of triumph, of celebrated men, bestarred with orders, swathed with ribbons; of women sparkling with jewels and rippling in silks; of a Prince who might "make" you with a smile or "mar" you with a frown; of many enemies concealed as friends; of wonderful music and exquisite food, for which she had no appetite. It was not until she had re-entered her dressing-room to be unrobed that she had once more the mind-space to reconsider Roger’s farewell and what life would mean to her without his constant companionship. Then, foreseeing otherwise a ghastly night of turning things over and over in her thoughts, she told Sophie she had bad neuralgia; and opening a tiny little casquet with a tiny little gold key on her bangle she took from it the materials for a sleeping draught, compounded them cautiously—she was the last person in the world to commit suicide, even by mistake—swallowed the dose and half an hour afterwards slipped into oblivion. The next morning she awoke with the inevitable headache, and the heartache returned. But there was the breakfast tray to distract her thoughts, and there were the morning letters. Among these was an invitation to meet an Oriental Potentate in very select company—an opportunity for display which she had coveted—and an invitation to dine with the Archbishop of Canterbury and Mrs. Benson, which she had sought for, as she wanted to allure the young Bensons into her circle of "souls."