"I prefer you do not touch me," she said clearly, yet in low tones.
"Oh, come!" he laughed uneasily. "Don't be foolish—"
"Did you hear me, Bayard?"
"You're making a scene—" the man flashed, colouring darkly.
"And," P. Sybarite interjected quietly, "I'll make it worse if you don't do as Miss Blessington bids you."
With a shrug, Shaynon removed his hand; but with no other acknowledgment of the little man's existence, pursued indulgently: "You have your carriage-call check ready, Marian? If you'll let me have it—"
"Let's understand one another, once and for all time, Bayard," the girl interrupted. "I don't wish you to take me home. I prefer to go alone. Is that clear? I don't wish to feel indebted to you for even so slight a service as this," she added, indicating the slip of pasteboard in her fingers. "But if Mr. Sybarite will be so kind—"
The little man accepted the card with no discernible sign of jubilation over Shaynon's discomfiture.
"Thank you," he said mildly; but waited close by her side.
For a moment Shaynon's face reminded him of one of the masks of crimson lacquer and black that grinned from the walls of Mrs. Inche's "den." But his accents, when he spoke, were even, if menacing in their tonelessness.