She nodded, rising suddenly from her chair.
"Oh, Jerry, don't be vexed, though you've a perfect right. I've made a ghastly, a perfectly hideous mistake. I—I can't think how I ever came to do it. But—but I wouldn't mind so frightfully if it weren't for you. That's what troubles me most—to have made a horrible mess of my life, and to have dragged you into it." Her voice shook, and she broke off for a moment, biting her lips. Then: "Oh, Jerry," she wailed, "I've done a dreadful thing—a dreadful thing! Don't you see it—what he will think of me—how he will despise me?"
The last words came muffled through her hands. Her head was bowed against the chimney-piece.
Jerry was nonplussed. He rose somewhat awkwardly, and drew near the bowed figure.
"But, my dear girl," he said, laying a slightly hesitating hand upon her shoulder, "what the devil does it matter what he thinks? Surely you don't—you can't care—care the toss of a half-penny?"
But here she amazed him still further.
"I do, Jerry, I do!" she whispered vehemently. "He's horrid—oh, he's horrid. But I can't help caring. I wanted him to think the very worst possible of me before I came. But now—but now—Then too, there's you," she ended irrelevantly. "What could they do to you, Jerry? Could they put you in prison?"
"Great Scott, no!" said Jerry. "You needn't cry over me. I always manage to fall on my feet. And, anyhow, it isn't a hanging matter. I say, cheer up, Nan, old girl! Don't you think you'd better go to bed? No? Well, let me play you something cheerful, then. I've never seen you in the dumps before. And I don't like it. I quite thought this would be one of our red-letter days. Look up, I say! I believe you're crying."
Nan was not crying, but such was the concern in his voice that she raised her head and smiled to reassure him.
"You're very, very good to me, Jerry," she said earnestly. "And oh, I do hope I haven't got you into trouble!"