"I? Oh, no, my dear fellow. I had never entered in the matrimonial stakes for that girl."
"Why not? Beatrix Vanderdyke was worth winning, surely? Money to burn, beauty, youth,—what else do you want?"
"I'm not a marrying man. As they will be pretty certain to say in my obituary notices, I am 'wedded to my art.' Besides, my dear fellow, I have the fortunate knack of getting what I want without the consent of the parson." There was the kind of snigger that only comes from men who belong to the lady-killer tribe.
That, and the gross innuendo that preceded it, carried Franklin to his feet. The lust to hit had seized him. He stalked round the book-case into the middle of the room. His hands were clenched and he was breathing deeply like a man who had been running. He recognized in the tall, red-tied, flamboyant person the man with whom he had seen Beatrix that night when he had left the apartment house with Malcolm Fraser.
"I was luckily in a position to overhear your remark," he said quietly. "I'm Franklin. Miss Vanderdyke is my wife."
The pale man drew in his breath, and a look of excitement and pleasure flashed into his eyes. The one thing that made him feel that he had any blood was a fight.
Sutherland York recovered himself quickly. But for the slight suggestion of whiteness about his mouth he seemed to be perfectly at ease and nonchalant. "I'm glad that you're glad," he said, with a polite smile. "Permit me to offer my congratulations upon your very sudden and romantic marriage."
Franklin went a step or two nearer. "If you were not such a fat, unmuscular brute," he said, slowly, and with the most careful distinctness, "if I shouldn't be laying myself open to a charge of cruelty to animals, I'd thrash you until you blubbered for mercy." He put his hands in his pockets. "Even if I did, it would have very little effect, except to send you to the dentist and the beauty doctor. Your sort of liar is never properly cured."
He waited for a moment, obviously to give the famous artist a chance to revenge himself in some way for the insult that he had deliberately made as strong as he could.
And the pale man eyed York expectantly, eagerly.