A great wave of self-pity swept through him and quite carried him off his feet. By precedent, it should have carried Janet off her feet, too.
She stood her ground in silence.
"For Heaven's sake, don't be obstinate," he said, his confidence beginning to desert him. "It isn't late yet," he added, in a more pleading tone. "We can still have an awfully good time this evening. Do be nice—"
"Nice!"
She stood up and looked at him. He mistook the mocking expression in her smiling gray eyes, and did not notice the faintly contracting brows above her long-lashed eyelids.
"Yes, nice and reasonable," he went on, pursuing what he thought an advantage.
"Reasonable!" The faint contraction was now a forbidding bar. "I'm trying hard to be reasonable, Claude."
After a pause, she smiled again. "You pull me one way, reason pulls me another," she said, with characteristic candor. "Now see if my plan doesn't follow reason. You left this morning, for a short while; I'm leaving tomorrow, for good and all. You left me in anger; I should like to leave you good friends. It isn't as easy as it sounds. Will you help me?"
He flung himself angrily into an armchair.
"You must be mad to think you can shift for yourself in a strange country."