"Yes, to the first; no, to the second," Eric answered. "Lady Barbara——"
"It must be 'yes' to the second, too, dear Eric. I rang her up at cock-crow to say that you wanted her to invite us together. You do, you know; you want to see whether last night's impression was true; that's why I asked you to lunch.… Now I want to know if you've a rehearsal to-day, because, if so——"
"Lady Barbara, I am going to cut you off," said Eric distinctly.
He hung up the receiver and was about to ring for his secretary, when his memory was arrested by the picture of Barbara springing to her feet, reviling him, collapsing on the sofa and bursting into tears. "Bully her, and she cries," he murmured impatiently. "Don't bully her, and she bullies you. I'm not cut out for the part of tame cat. Another forty-eight hours, and she'll expect me to drive round London and look at dresses with her.…" But if his petulance had made her cry again … Eric hunted for a pen and, without involving himself in delicacies of address, wrote—"I am not discourteous by preference, but you drive me to it. La comedia è finita." He left the note unsigned and asked his secretary to have it sent by hand to Berkeley Square. When it had left him past recall, he felt that he could have done better; and he knew that he would have done best of all by not writing.… But he was irritated by her too insistent unconventionality; irritated and yet rawly elated by his ascendancy over her.
His secretary returned, and he dictated to her until half-past nine struck. It was his signal to get up so that he could be dressed by ten, so that he could work from ten till one, so that he could walk out and lunch at one-thirty, observing his time-table punctually.
The telephone rang again, and Mrs. Shelley enquired tonelessly whether he had received her invitation.
"Oh, Eric! I did hope you could come!" she exclaimed. "Can't you reconsider? Poor Babs seems so anxious to see you again."
Mrs. Shelley, then, had the wit to guess where the initiative lay.
"I'm afraid that the privilege of gratifying Lady Barbara's whims——"
He forgot how he had meant to finish the sentence, and there was a pause.