even when the prospect backwards was so bewilderingly attractive, so
tantalizingly easy. He stammered badly when, at length, the silence
which followed the soft voice had to be filled.

"I'm simply--simply--broken up, Miss Margery," and the girl's eyes
looked at him with a sweet wideness that made it harder. "I don't know
how to tell you, and I don't know how to resign myself to it either, but
I--I can't take you to the theater. I--I've got to--got to--well, you
see, I've got to be with Billy."

She spoke quickly at that. "Mr. Fairfax, is Billy really ill--is there
something more than I understand? Why didn't you tell me? Has their
been an accident, perhaps? Why, I must go to him too--come--hurry--I'll
go with you, of course."

Rex stumbled again in his effort to quiet her alarm, to prevent this
scheme of seeking Billy on his couch of pain. "Oh no, indeed you mustn't
do that," he objected strenuously. "I couldn't let you, you know. I
don't want you to be bothered. Billy isn't ill at all--there hasn't been
any accident, I give you my word. He's all right--Billy's all right." He
had quite lost his prospective by now, and did not see the rocks upon
which he rushed.

"If Billy's all right, why isn't he here?" demanded Billy's cousin
severely.

Rex saw now. "He isn't exactly--that is to say--all right, you know. You
see how it is," and he gazed involuntarily at the sleeping giant huddled
on the truck.