"Ah, mon cher, now I have hurt you! Naturally I know you cannot care for this creature, this mountain of fat, cette espèce de vache espagnole"—she uttered the epithet literally through her teeth—"but all the same I know that she wants you, and I also know that if you go so far away—thousands and thousands of miles—it will be the end. You know it too."
Out of the tail of her eye, Esther saw the young man merely shrug his shoulders. She grew more and more interested.
"Listen, Arthur. Can we not find you something here?"
"Good God, in Cannes?"
She answered the utter contempt of this with a burst of self-reproach.
"Mon Dieu, mon Dieu, c'est de ma faute, si j'avais su——"
"Oh, cut it, old girl, what's the good of post-mortems?"
"But it was my fault! If only I hadn't let him think it was baccarat—if I'd thought of some other excuse! But I never knew, I never dreamed—and now, of course, I'm so utterly helpless, my hands are tied!"
She made a hysterical gesture which shivered the diamond bangles in a mass together.
"Oh, well——"