"I'm going to burn this. Have you anything else to say?"
"Yes. Good God, Jack, don't you care for your wife? Can't you?"
"No."
"Why?"
"I don't know." His tone became querulous. "How can a man tell why he becomes indifferent to a woman? I don't know. I never did know. I can't explain it. But he does."
Grandcourt stared at him. And suddenly the latent fear that had been torturing him for the last two weeks died out utterly: this man would never need watching to prevent any attempt at self-destruction; this man before him was not of that caste. His self-centred absorption was of a totally different nature.
He said, very red in the face, but with a voice well modulated and even:
"I think I've made a good deal of an ass of myself. I think I may safely be cast for that rôle in future. Most people, including yourself, think I'm fitted for it; and most people, and yourself, are right. And I'll admit it now by taking the liberty of asking you whom you were with in Baltimore."
"None of your damned business!" said Dysart, wheeling short on him.
"Perhaps not. I did not believe it at the time, but I do now.... And her brother is after you with a gun."