“Well, try to think of somebody besides yourself.  You’re not the only miserable person in this city.  I’ve all the misery I can carry at present; and if you wish to help me, don’t make any demands on me until I’m clear of the tangle that’s choking me.”

“Dear, I only wanted to help you—­” she stammered, appalled at his tone and words.

“All right, then, let me alone!” he snarled, losing all self-command.  “I’ve stood about all of this I’m going to, from you and your brother both!  Is that plain?  I want to be let alone.  That is plainer still, isn’t it?”

“Yes,” she said.  Her face had become deathly white; she stood frozen, motionless, clutching the receiver in her small hand.

His voice altered as he spoke again: 

“Don’t feel hurt; I lost my temper and I ask your pardon.  But I’m half crazy with worry—­you’ve seen to-day’s papers, I suppose—­so you can understand a man’s losing his temper.  Please forgive me; I’ll try to see you when I can—­when it’s advisable.  Does that satisfy you?”

“Yes,” she said in a dull voice.

She put away the receiver and, turning, dropped onto her bed.  At eight o’clock the maid who had come to announce dinner found her young mistress lying there, clenched hands over her eyes, lying slim and rigid on her back in the darkness.

When the electric lamps were lighted she rose, went to the mirror and looked steadily at herself for a long, long time.

* * * * *

She tasted what was offered, seeing nothing, hearing nothing; later, in her room, a servant came saying that Mr. Gray begged a moment’s interview on a matter of importance connected with her brother.

It was the only thing that could have moved her to see him.  She had denied herself to him all that winter; she had been obliged to make it plainer after a letter from him—­a nice, stupid, boyish letter, asking her to marry him.  And her reply terminated the attempts of Bunbury Gray to secure a hearing from the girl who had apparently taken so sudden and so strange an aversion to a man who had been nice to her all her life.

They had, at one time, been virtually engaged, after Geraldine Seagrave had cut him loose, and before Dysart took the trouble to seriously notice her.  But Bunny was youthful and frisky and his tastes were catholic, and it did not seem to make much difference that Dysart again stepped casually between them in his graceful way.  Yet, curiously enough, each preserved for the other a shy sort of admiration which, until last autumn, had made their somewhat infrequent encounters exceedingly interesting.  Autumn had altered their attitudes; Bunny became serious in proportion to the distance she put between them—­which is of course the usual incentive to masculine importunity.  They had had one or two little scenes at Roya-Neh; the girl even hesitated, unquietly curious, perplexed at her own attitude, yet diffidently interested in the man.