"Why not?" she said, in a sombre tone. "It _is_ gloomy--_how_ gloomy I know better than you!" ("She might well do that," thought Tourmalin.) "Why did I not see that I was slowly, imperceptibly drifting--drifting?" "Well," said Peter, with a levity he was far from feeling, "if the drifting was imperceptible, you naturally _wouldn't_ see it, you know!" "You might have spared a joke at such a time as this!" she cried, indignantly. "I--I wasn't aware there was a close time for jokes," he said, humbly; "not that it was much of a joke!" "Indeed it was not," she replied. "But oh, Peter, _how_ we have both drifted!" "Have we?" he exclaimed, blankly. "I--I mean--_haven't_ we?" "I was so blind--so wilfully, foolishly blind! I told myself we were friends!" "Surely we are?" he said, retaking possession of her hand; he had entirely forgotten Sophia in the ironmongery department, at Tottenham Court Road. "I--I understood we were on that footing?" "No," she said; "let us have no subterfuges any more--we must look facts in the face. After what we have both said to-night, we can no longer deceive ourselves by words.... Peter," she broke off suddenly, "I am going to ask you a question, and on your answer my fate--and yours too, perhaps--will depend! Tell me truthfully...." Her voice failed her for the moment, as she bent over towards him, and clutched his arm tightly in her excitement; her eyes shone with a wild, intense eagerness for his reply.... "Would you----" she repeated.... "Would you have the bottle-jack all brass, or japanned? The brass ones are a shilling more." Peter gave a violent start, for the voice in which this most incongruous and irrelevant question was put was that of Sophia! Miss Davenport with her hysterical appeal, the steamer-chairs, and the starlight, all had fled, and he stood, supporting himself limply by the arm of the chimney-nook in the upholsterer's showroom, staring at Sophia, who stood there, sedate and practical, inviting his attention to a couple of bottle-jacks which an assistant was displaying with an obsequious smile: the transition was rather an abrupt one. "Oh, I think the brass one is very nice," he stammered, feebly enough. "Then that settles it," remarked Sophia; "we'll take the _japanned_ one, please," she said to the assistant. "Aren't you feeling well, Peter dear?" she asked presently, in an undertone. "You look so odd!" "Quite well," he said; "I--ah!--was thinking of something else for the moment, and you startled me, that's all." "You had such a far-away expression in your eyes," said Sophia, "and you did jump so when I spoke to you; you should really try to conquer that tendency to let yourself wander, Peter." "I will, my love," he said; and he meant it, for he had let himself wander farther than he quite intended. CHAPTER III. The Third Cheque. _Good Resolutions._--_Casuistry._--_A Farewell Visit._--_Small Profit and a Quick Return._