"They hurt their mouths, M'sieur." He ground out his cigarette savagely. "Handle them gently." And he had told her, when she mentioned her hundred a year, that she had already spent two in four months. It was true, but—what the devil had that got to do with it?
And then John Fordingham. Hugh's jaw set as he thought of that row. There he had been right—absolutely right. Fordingham was a man whose reputation was notorious. He specialized in young married women, and he was a very successful specialist. He was one of those men with lots of money, great personal charm, and the morals of a monkey. That was exactly what Hugh had said to her before flatly forbidding her to have anything to do with him.
He recalled now the sudden uplift of her shoulders, the straight, level look of her eyes.
"Forbid?" she had said.
"Forbid," he had answered. "The man is an outsider of the purest water."
And he had been right—absolutely right. He took out his cigarette-case again, and even as he did so he became rigid. Coming down the steps of the restaurant was the man himself, with Doris.
For a few moments everything danced before his eyes. The blood was rushing to his head: tables, lights, the moving waiters, swam before him in a red haze. Then he shrank back behind the pillar in front and waited for them to sit down. He saw her glance towards the table at which they had usually sat—the table which he had refused to have that night; then she followed Fordingham to one which had evidently been reserved for him at the other end of the restaurant. She sat down with her back towards Hugh, and by leaning forward he could just see her neck and shoulders gleaming white through the bit of flame-coloured gauze she was wearing over her frock.
His eyes rested on her companion, and for a while Hugh studied him critically and impartially. Faultlessly turned out, he was bending towards Doris with just the right amount of deferential admiration on his face. Occasionally he smiled, showing two rows of very white teeth, and as he talked he moved his hands in little gestures which were more foreign than English. They were well-shaped hands, perfectly manicured, a fact of which their owner was fully aware.
After a time Fordingham ceased to do the talking. The occasional smiles showed no more; a serious look, with just a hint of slave-like devotion in it, showed on his face as he listened to Doris. Once or twice he shook his head thoughtfully; once or twice he allowed his eyes to meet hers with an expression which required no interpretation.
"My poor child," it said; "my poor little hardly used girl. Don't you know that I love you, tenderly, devotedly? But, of coarse, I couldn't dream of saying so. I'm only just a friend."