"Yes, and another with Jack Dysart. I'll have some more presently. Does it concern you?"
"I think so, Geraldine."
"You are wrong. Neither does what you've been doing concern me—the kind of man you've been—the various phases of degradation you have accomplished——"
"What particular species of degradation?" he asked wearily, knowing that Dysart was now bent on his destruction. "Never mind; don't answer, Geraldine," he added, "because there's no use in trying to set myself right; there's no way of doing it. All I can say is that I care absolutely nothing for Sylvia Quest, nor she for me; that I love you; that if I have ever been unworthy of you—as God knows I have—it is a bitterer memory to me than it could ever be to you."
"Shall we go back?" she said evenly.
"Yes, if you wish."
They walked back together in silence; a jolly company claimed them for their table; Geraldine laughingly accepted a glass of champagne, turning her back squarely on Duane.
Naïda and Kathleen came across.
"We waited for you as long as we could," said his pretty sister, smothering a yawn. "I'm horribly sleepy. Duane, it's three o'clock. Would you mind taking me across to the house?"
He cast a swift, anxious glance at Geraldine; her vivid colour, the splendour of her eyes, her feverish laughter were ominous. With her were Gray and Sylvia, rather noisy in their gaiety, and the boisterous Pink 'uns, and Jack Dysart, lingering near, the make-up on his face in ghastly contrast to his ashen pallor and his fixed and unvaried grin.