Constance nodded. "I wasn't quite sobered up. But anyway I did want to stay. You can't understand that, can you?"

"No; I can't."

"Because you're a cold-blooded little fish. I'm still feeling that dam' Bacardi or I wouldn't be talking to you this way."

"Was Fred feeling it, too?"

"If he was, he had a grip on himself all right. He's a lot squarer man than people give him credit for, Dee."

"Lucky for you he is."

"Oh, I don't know. What's the difference!" retorted Connie perversely. "I guess those sort of things happen a lot more often than any of us know about."

"What sort of things?" interpolated a voice new to the parley.

The two sisters whirled about. Just outside the door stood Patricia in her tousled nightgown, hot-eyed with curiosity. "What sort of things?" she repeated.