MALISE. No, no! We shall find something. Keep your soul alive at
all costs. What! let him hang on to you till you're nothing but--
emptiness and ache, till you lose even the power to ache. Sit in his
drawing-room, pay calls, play Bridge, go out with him to dinners,
return to--duty; and feel less and less, and be less and less, and so
grow old and--die!

[The bell rings.]

MALISE. [Looking at the door in doubt] By the wayhe'd no means of
tracing you?

[She shakes her head.]

[The bell rings again.]

MALISE. Was there a man on the stairs as you came up?

CLARE. Yes. Why?

MALISE. He's begun to haunt them, I'm told.

CLARE. Oh! But that would mean they thought I--oh! no!

MALISE. Confidence in me is not excessive.

CLARE. Spying!

MALISE. Will you go in there for a minute? Or shall we let them
ring--or--what? It may not be anything, of course.