He held her hand in his. 'Miss Durwent,' he said, 'I cannot express what I mean. But if this makes any difference at all, it is only that I admire you infinitely more for'——
'No—please—please say nothing more,' she cried with a sound of pain in her voice.
'But may I come and see you again?'
She withdrew her hand and pressed it against her brow.
'Yes. I—I don't know. Good-night. Please don't say any more.' The words ended in a choking, tearless sob. She stepped into the car, and with no further sign to him threw in the clutch and started away.
Huddled in the corner, his pale face glistening in the lamplight of the street, the Honourable Richard Durwent lay in a drunken sleep.
CHAPTER VIII.
INTERMEZZO.
It was several months later—May 1914, to be precise—when Austin Selwyn made the determination, common to most men, to remain in for an evening and catch up in his correspondence.
After the manner of his species, he produced a small army of letters from various pockets, and spreading them in a heap on his desk, proceeded to answer the more urgent, and postpone the less important to a further occasion when conscience would again overcome indolence. For an hour he wrote trivial politenesses to hostesses who had extended hospitality or were going to do so; there was a reply to a literary agent, one to a moving-picture concern, an answer to a critic, and a note of thanks to an admirer.