"Oh! I'm so _glad_ I've left her," says Perpetua, with indeed
heartfelt delight in look and tone. "But--do you know--I'm hungry.
You--you couldn't let me make you a cup of tea, could you? I'm
dreadfully thirsty! What's that in your glass?"

"Nothing," says the professor hastily. He removes the half-finished
tumbler of whisky and soda, and places it in the open cupboard.

"It looked like _something,"_ says she. "But what about tea?"

"I'll see what I can do," says he, beginning to busy himself amongst
many small contrivances in the same cupboard. It has gone to his
heart to hear that she is hungry and thirsty, but even in the midst
of his preparations for her comfort, a feeling of rage takes
possession of him.

He pulls his head out of the cupboard and turns to her.

"You must be _mad!"_ says he.

"Mad? Why?" asks she.

"To come here. Here! And at this hour!"

"There was no other place: and I wasn't going to live under _her_
roof another second. I said to myself that she was my aunt, but you
were my guardian. Both of you have been told to look after me, and I
prefer to be looked after by you. It is so simple," says she, with a
suspicion of contempt in her tone, "that I wonder why you wonder at
it. As I preferred _you_--of course I have come to live with you."