"Tommy--told me not to interrupt you--and him."

"Well--it's true."

He was young, and French, and she was beautiful and he was desperately
in love with her. Kneeling suddenly on the damp grass, he buried his
face in his arms as they lay limply across the sun-dial. There was a
long pause. He did not sob, he was quite still, but every line of him
proclaimed unspeakable agony.

"Poor boy," she said gently.

Then he rose. "I am not a boy," he declared, his chin twitching but his
voice firm, "and I love you. He is old and--_c'est un vieux roué_. I at
least am young and I have lived a clean life."

He asked her no question, but she paused to consider. "I know, I
understand," he continued, "you hate this life, you are bored and sick
of it all; you do not love your mother. _Mon Dieu, ne pas pouvoir aimer
sa mère!_ And you want to get away. Then--marry me instead. I am not so
rich, but I am rich. And, ah, I love you--_je t'aime_."

Poor Pontefract, leaning back in his big Mercedes trying to realise his
bliss, was jilted before Brigit had spoken a word. Like a flash, his
image seemed to stand before her, beside the delightful boy-man whose
youth and niceness pleaded so strongly to her. She did not consider that
breaking her word was not fair play, she had no thought of pity for
Pontefract. She loved nobody, and therefore thought solely of herself.
This boy was right. She would be happier with him than with poor, old,
fat Ponty. So poor, old, fat Ponty went to the wall, and putting her