"Go, I say! Oh, can't you go!"
"Yes, I'll go—when you say it. Tell me! Do you love me—have you ever loved me?—the veriest little bit?"
"Never. Not the veriest little bit," she said, looking straight at him.
"That's it!—the truth at last—spoken like a m—like a lady!"—he bowed mockingly at her—"and it proves you are false—false, do you understand?—unspeakably false! And I have loved you like m—but very well, it's better so—perhaps."
He turned to go; but turned quickly about.
"I'll kiss you once if I swing for it!—for what I thought you were"—and, for a moment robbed by anger of his sense of proprieties, with unpardonable roughness he crushed and kissed her, flung her violently from him, and went, without looking back at her.
* * * * *
Mrs. Hazard, looking across the shoulders of a knot of her guests, caught a glimpse of Rutledge as he passed down the hall toward the outer door. She waited a minute or more for him to reappear, and when he had not done so she lost interest in the people and things about her. At the first possible moment she sought Elise, and found her again sitting before the grate. Lola came into the room so quickly and quietly that Elise had not time to dissemble, if she had wished to do so. Her head was thrown back against the chair and both hands covered her face. Lola took her wrists and against some little resistance pulled her hands away.
"Elise?" she said.
"He does not love me," Elise replied, defensively, without opening her eyes.