The weary talk wore to its close, ending with angry petulance on his side, and, at last, on hers with a grief that was half anger. He could not believe in her decision, unless there were one who had displaced him; and, seeing none save Ruston, in spite of his own convictions, he broke at last into a demand to be told whether she thought of him. Marjory started in horror, crying, "No, no," and, for all Evan's preoccupation, her vehemence amazed him.
"Oh, you've found him out too, perhaps," he sneered. "You've found him out by now. All the same, it was his fault that you didn't care for me before."
"Evan," she implored, "do, pray, not talk like that. There's not a man in the whole world that I would not have for my husband rather than him."
"Now," he repeated; "but I'm speaking of before."
Half angry again at that he should allow himself such an insinuation, she yet liked him too well, and felt too unhappy to be insincere.
"Well," she said with a troubled smile, "if you like, I've found him out."
"Then, Marjory," cried Evan, in a spasm of reviving hope, "if that fellow's out of the way——"
But she would not hear him, and he flung himself out of the house with a rudeness that his love pardoned.
She heard him go, in aching sorrow that he, who felt few things deeply, should feel this one so deeply. Then, following the calls of society, which are followed in spite of most troubles, she, pale-faced and sad, and her mother, almost weeping in motherly distress, dressed themselves to go to a party. Lady Semingham was at home that night.
At the party all was gay and bright. Lady Semingham was chattering to Mr. Otto Heather. Semingham was trying to make Mr. Foster Belford understand the story of the Baron and Willie Ruston, Lord Detchmore, who had come in from a public dinner, was conspicuous in his blue riband, and was listening to Adela Ferrars with a smile on his face. Marjory sat down in a corner, hoping to escape introductions, and, when an old friend carried her mother off to eat an ice, she kept her place. Presently she heard cried, "Mrs. Dennison," and Maggie came in with her usual grace. It seemed as though the last few months were blotted out, and they were all again at that first party at Mrs. Dennison's where Willie Ruston had made his entrée. The illusion was not to lack confirmation, for, a moment later, Ruston himself was announced, and the sound of his name made Adela turn her head for one swift moment from her distinguished companion.