"Derrick!" she said, with a flash of anger.
"I can't help it!" Derrick said passionately. "I've been counting on this, living for this. Averil I—I—you can call me mad if you like, but if you send me away again—I believe I shall shoot myself."
"What nonsense!" exclaimed Averil, half-angry, half-scornful.
He dropped her hands and stood quite still for the space of a few seconds, his face white and twitching. And then, to her utter amazement, he sank heavily into a chair and covered his face with his hands.
"Dick!" she ejaculated.
Silence followed the word, a breathless silence. Derrick sat perfectly motionless, his fingers gripping his hair. At last Averil moved up to him, a little frightened by his stillness, and very intensely compassionate. She bent and touched his shoulder.
"Dick!" she said. "Dick! Don't!"
He stirred under her hand, but did not raise his head. "Get away, Averil!" he muttered. "You don't understand."
And quite suddenly Averil was transported back to the far, receding schooldays, when Derrick had got into trouble for smoking his first cigar. The memory unconsciously influenced her speech.
"But, Dick," she said persuasively, "don't you think you are the least bit in the world unreasonable? It's true I don't quite understand. We've been such splendid chums all our lives, I really don't see why we should begin to be anything different now. Besides, Dick"—there was appeal in her voice—"I don't truly want to get married. It seems such a silly thing to go and do when one had such really jolly times without. It does spoil things so."