"Told you what?"

"That the world hadn't been quite kind."

Nan felt a sudden reckless instinct to tempt fate. There was already a
breach in her privacy; for this one evening she did not care if the
wall were wholly battered down.

"Tell me," she queried with averted head, "how--how much did you
understand?"

Mallory scrutinised her reflectively.

"You really wish it?"

"Yes, really."

He was silent a moment. Then he spoke slowly, as though choosing his
words.

"Fate has given you one of her back-handers, I think, and you want the
thing you can't have--want it rather badly. And just now--nothing
seems quite worth while."

"Go on," she said very low.

He hesitated. Then, as if suddenly making up his mind to hit hard, as
a surgeon might decide to use the knife, he spoke incisively: