immensely a long long walk by myself ... through the streets,
with the lights coming out ...."

He laid his hand on her arm. "I say, my dear, you're not ill?"

"No; I'm not ill. But you may say I am, to-night at the
Embassy."

He released her and drew back. "Oh, very well," he answered
coldly; and she understood by his tone that the knot was cut,
and that at that moment he almost hated her. She turned away,
hastening down the deserted alley, flying from him, and knowing,
as she fled, that he was still standing there motionless,
staring after her, wounded, humiliated, uncomprehending. It was
neither her fault nor his ....



XXIII

AS she fled on toward the lights of the streets a breath of
freedom seemed to blow into her face.

Like a weary load the accumulated hypocrisies of the last months
had dropped from her: she was herself again, Nick's Susy, and
no one else's. She sped on, staring with bright bewildered eyes
at the stately facades of the La Muette quarter, the
perspectives of bare trees, the awakening glitter of shop-
windows holding out to her all the things she would never again
be able to buy ....