In horror, she flew to the door and threw it open.
“Go,” she said.
And speeding across the hall she threw open the flat door.
“Go,” she said again.
She crossed the landing and rang the lift bell and returned to the hall, where he met her and threw himself on his knees and looked up at her with wild, hunted eyes.
“Forgive me, Olivia. For God’s sake forgive me. I was mad. I didn’t know what I was saying. Shut that door and I’ll tell you everything.”
But Olivia passed him by into the sitting-room, and stood with her back against the door until she heard the clash of the lift gates and the retreating footsteps of Bobby Quinton.
A short while ago she had nearly quarrelled with Mauregard because, in a wordy dissertation on the modern young men who lived on women, he instanced Bobby as possibly coming within the category. Now she knew that Mauregard was right. She felt sick. Also deadly ashamed of her superior attitude of well-meant reprimand. She burned with the consciousness of tongue in cheek while he listened. Well, that was the end of the Lydian galley.
She did not recover till the next afternoon, when Triona called to take her to the Blenkirons’ Sunday intellectual symposium in Fielder’s Park. She welcomed him impulsively with both hands outstretched, as a justification of her faith in mankind.
“You can’t tell how glad I am to see you.”