She had worked herself up to utter recklessness.
"Because of everything," she spat forth. "Because I'm in a rage—because I'm sick of her and her duchesses. And I'm most sick of you hovering about her as if she were a princess of the blood and you were her Grand Chamberlain. Why don't you marry her yourself—baby and all! Then you'll be sure there'll be another Head of the House of Coombe!"
She knew then that she had raved like a fishwife—that, even though there had before been no fishwives in Mayfair, he saw one standing shrilling before him. It was in his eyes and she knew it before she had finished speaking, for his look was maddening. It enraged her even further and she shook in the air the hand with the big purple amethyst ring, still clutching the end of the bedizened purple scarf. She was intoxicated with triumph—for she had reached him.
"I will! I will!" she cried. "I will—to-morrow!"
"You will not!" his voice rang out as she had never heard it before. He even took a step forward. Then came the hurried leap of feet up the narrow staircase and Owen Delamore flung the door wide, panting:
"You told me to dash in," he almost shouted. "They're coming! We can rush round to the Sinclairs'. They're on the roof already!"
She caught the purple scarf around her and ran towards him, for at this new excitement her frenzy reached its highest note.
"I will! I will!" she called back to Coombe as she fled out of the room and she held up and waved at him again the hand with the big amethyst. "I will, to-morrow!"
Lord Coombe was left standing in the garish, crowded little drawing-room listening to ominous sounds in the street—to cries, running feet and men on fleeing bicycles shouting warnings as they sped at top speed and strove to clear the way.