We travelled back together, and I drove Margaret back to her flat in Gloucester Place. On the way we were held up by a traffic block at the Marble Arch. A car halted beside us, and as I glanced casually at it it seemed familiar. And then I saw Ethel, smoking a cigarette and talking to an elderly man with jackal’s eyes. She saw me a second later. The cigarette dropped from her hand, and she craned forward to see who was with me, and then the dam broke and we went on down Great Cumberland Place. “That was my wife in that car,” I said to Margaret. I saw her hand tremble. “Did she see us? Does it matter?” “She certainly saw me,” I replied, “and it matters not at all. But if I know her, she’s the most frightened woman in London.” We parted miserably and uncertainly, comforting each other with vague hopes of some solution. When I got back to Paradown, Ethel was waiting for me. She was shaking with the rage of terror as she rushed at me. “Who was that woman you were with? Someone you picked up in Paris, I suppose. That’s what you call working at your rotten book! Who is she?” “A Miss Pascal,” I said. “Have you been living in Paris together?” “Yes.” “Are you in love with her?” “Yes,” I said wearily. “Oh, you are, are you? and planning to get rid of me. Well, I’m afraid you won’t find it so easy. Remember this; I’ll never divorce you or give you a chance to divorce me. You beast and hypocrite! Pretending to be so cold and pious, and then sneaking off to Paris with the first low woman you can find!” I said nothing. The only chance to bring her scenes to a close was to keep silence. Replying merely fed them. “Can’t you speak, you beastly fool? Are you trying to get rid of me?” “No,” I replied, “but I think we’d do better to separate.” “Oh, you do! Well, you’ve had my answer. I’ll never leave you. I’ve seen you look like a fiend at me, as if you wished I were dead, but if I were, I’d still come between you and that strumpet.” The application of that disgusting epithet to Margaret began to rouse the killer in me, but I rallied all my self-control to subdue it. “Well, then,” I said, “there’s no need for such a scene as this. If you insist, you shall remain my wife in name, but in nothing more. I cannot inhabit the same house with you, but I will make you as generous an allowance as I can afford.” “I imagine,” sneered Ethel, “that when that little drab has been through your pockets it won’t be so generous!”