The “little milliner” was nowhere to be seen, and Kitty herself was ensconced on the Chesterfield, enjoying an iced lemon-squash and a cigarette, while Penelope and Barry were downstairs playing a desultory game of billiards.  The irregular click of the ivory balls came faintly to Mallory’s ears.

“Got my fan, Peter?  Heaps of thanks.  What will you have?  A whisky-and-soda? . . .  Why—­Peter—­”

She broke on abruptly as she caught sight of his face.  He was rather pale and his eyes had a tired, beaten look in them.

“What’s wrong, Peter?”

He smiled down at her as she lay tucked up amongst her cushions.

“Why should there be anything wrong?”

“Something is,” replied Kitty decidedly.  “Did I swish you away from the flat against your will?”

“I should be a very ungrateful person if I failed to appreciate my present privileges.”

She shook her head disgustedly.

“You’re a very annoying person!” she returned.  “You invariably take refuge in a compliment.”

“Dear Madame Kitty”—­Mallory leaned forward and looked down at her with his steady grey-blue eyes—­“dear Madame Kitty, I say to you what I mean.  I do not compliment my friends”—­his voice deepened—­“my dear, trusted friends.”

His foreign twist of phrase was unusually pronounced, as always in moments of strong feeling.

“But that’s just it!” she declared emphatically.  “You’re not trusting me—­you’re keeping me outside the door.”

“Believe me, there’s nothing you’d wish to see—­the other side.”

“Which means that in any case it’s no use knocking at a door that won’t be opened,” said Kitty, apparently yielding the point.  “So we’ll switch off that subject and get on to the next.  We go down to Mallow Court at the end of this week.  I can’t stand town in July.  What date are you coming to us?”

Peter was silent a moment, his eyes bent on the ground.  Then he raised his head suddenly as though he had just come to a decision.

“I’m afraid I shan’t be able to come down,” he said quietly.

“But you promised us!” objected Kitty.  “Peter, you can’t go back on a promise!”

He regarded her gravely.  Then: 

“Sometimes one has to do—­even that.”

Kitty, discerning in his refusal another facet of that “something wrong” she had suspected, clasped her hands round her knees and faced him with deliberation.

“Look here, Peter, it isn’t you to break a promise without some real good reason.  You say you can’t come down to us at Mallow.  Why not?”

He met her eyes steadily.

“I can’t answer that,” he replied.

Kitty remained obdurate.

“I want an answer, Peter.  We’ve been pals for some time now, and”—­with vigour—­“I’m not going to be kept out of whatever it is that’s hurting you.  So tell me.”

He made no answer, and she slipped down from the Chesterfield and came to his side.