The words were boyish enough, but there was something of real tragedy in his young voice, something that forced the realisation home to Sangster that perhaps it was not merely dog-in-the-manger jealousy that was goading him now, but genuine pain.  He looked at him quickly and away again.  Jimmy’s face was twitching.  If he had been a woman one would have said that he was on the verge of an hysterical outburst.  Sangster rose to the occasion.

“Let’s go and get a drink,” he said prosaically.  “I’m as dry as dust and we haven’t had any lunch.”

Jimmy said he wasn’t hungry, that he couldn’t eat a morsel of anything if it were to save his life.  He broke out again into a fresh torrent of abuse of Kettering.  He cursed him up hill and down dale.  Even when they were in the restaurant to which Sangster insisted on going he could not stop Jimmy’s flow of expletives.  One or two people lunching near looked at them in amazement.  In desperation Sangster ordered a couple of brandies; he forced Jimmy to drink one.  Presently he quieted a little.  He sat with his elbows on the table and his head in his hands.  With the passing of his passionate rage, depression seemed to have gripped him.  He was sullen and morose, he would not answer when Sangster spoke to him; when they left the restaurant he insisted on going back to Christine’s hotel.

He questioned the porter closely.  Where had she gone?  Had they driven away together or walked?

They had had a taxi, the man told him.  He began to look rather alarmed; there was something in Jimmy’s white face and burning eyes that meant mischief, he thought.  He told the “Boots” afterwards:  “We shall hear more of this—­you mark my words.”

“A taxi—­yes. . . .  Go on.”  Jimmy moistened his dry lips.  “You—­you didn’t hear where—­what directions? . . .”

“Yes, sir.  The gentleman told me to say Euston, told me to tell the driver to go to Euston, I mean, sir——­” the man explained in confusion.  He was red in the face now and embarrassed.

“Euston,” said Jimmy and Sangster together.  They looked at one another, Jimmy with a sort of dread in his eyes, Sangster with anxiety.

“Yes, sir.  Euston it was, I’m sure.  And the gentleman told me to tell the driver to go as fast as he could.”

There was a little silence.  Sangster slipped a hand through Jimmy’s arm.

“Thanks—­thanks very much,” he said.  He led Jimmy away.

He called a taxi and told the man to drive to Jimmy’s rooms.  He made no attempt to speak, did not know what to say.  Jimmy was leaning back with closed eyes.

Presently: 

“Do you think she’s gone?” he asked huskily.

Sangster made a hurried gesture of denial: 

“No, no.”

Jimmy laughed mirthlessly.

“She has,” he said.  “I know she has.  Serves me damned well right.  It’s all I deserve.”  There was a little pause.  “Well,” he said, “she’s more than got her own back, if it’s any consolation to her to know it.”