"Oh, she said she just couldn't stick it," he answered with an off-handed but tremulous little laugh.
"Stick what?"
"Everything."
I knew what he meant by "everything." He meant, simply, this confounded Case. Now, it appeared, it had power to break off an engagement and to bring Rooke down to dirty table-cloths, unmade beds and marmalade out of the grocer's pot.
"Look here, Monty," I began, touching his sleeve, "we've been friends for quite a number of years now——"
"Oh, don't," he interrupted me petulantly. "Leave a fellow alone."
"No, I'm not going to leave you alone like this. I want you to tell me why you left the studio, and why Mrs. Cunningham's gone off on tour, and a number of other things."
Well, it took time, but bit by bit he yielded. In sullen, resentful sentences he began to talk.
"What do I mean by everything?" he said. "Well, I mean everything. Nothing's gone right. Nothing at all. Everybody's fed up to the back teeth, Esdaile too. And all that stupid business last week just about put the tin hat on it."
"Do you mean that photograph in the papers?"