Jimmy said he was dashed if he wanted to. He said he had had enough of life; it was a rotten swindle from beginning to end.
Gladys frowned.
"If you're going to talk like an utter idiot!" she said impatiently.
He caught her hand when she would have moved away.
"I'm sorry. You might be a pal to a chap, Gladys. I—well, I'm at my wits' end to know what to do. With Horatio coming home——"
Her eyes grew scornful.
"Oh, so that's why you've come here!"
"It is and it isn't. I wanted to see Christine. You won't believe me, I know, but I've been worried to death about her ever since she left me. Ask Sangster, if you don't believe me. I swear to you that, if it were possible, I'd give my right hand this minute to undo all the rotten past and start again. I suppose it's too late. I suppose she hates me. She said she did that last night in London. She looks as if she does now. The way she asked me if I was going to stay to dinner—a chap's own wife!—and in front of that brute Kettering!"
"He isn't a brute."
Gladys walked away and poured herself another cup of tea.