“It’s not finished,” he repeated.  “It never will be—­till you’re my wife.”

Magda laughed lightly.

“Then I’m afraid it will have to remain unfinished—­a continued-in-our-next kind of thing.  For I certainly haven’t the least intention of becoming your wife.  Do understand that I mean it.  And please go away.  You had no business to come down here at all.”

A smouldering fire lit itself in his eyes.

“No!” he said, taking a step nearer her.  “No!  I’m not going.  I came because I can’t bear it any longer without you.  Since you went away I’ve been half-mad, I think.  I can’t eat or sleep!  I can’t even play!”—­he flung out his sensitive musician’s hands in a gesture of despair.

Magda glanced at him quickly.  It was true.  The man looked as though he had been suffering.  She had not noticed it before.  His face had altered—­worn a trifle fine; the line from chin to cheek-bone had hollowed somewhat and his eyes held a certain feverish brightness.  But although she could see the alteration, it did not move her in the least.  She felt perfectly indifferent.  It was as though the band of ice which seemed to have clasped itself about her heart when she heard of Michael’s marriage had frozen her capacity for feeling anything at all.

“I thought once”—­Davilof was speaking again—­“I thought once that you had said ‘no’ to me because of Quarrington.  But now I know you never cared for him——­”

“How do you know?”

The question sprang from her lips before she was aware.

“How do I know?” Davilof laughed harshly.  “Why, because the man who was loved by Magda Wielitzska wouldn’t marry any other woman.  There would be no other woman in the world for him. . . .  There’s no other woman in the world for me.”  His control was rapidly deserting him.  “Magda, I can’t live without you!  I’ve told you—­I can neither eat nor sleep.  I burn for you!  If you refuse to give yourself to me, you destroy me!”

Swept by an emotion stronger than himself, his acquired Englishisms went by the board.  He was all Pole in the picturesque ardour of his speech.

Magda regarded him calmly.

“My dear Davilof,” she said quietly.  “What weight do you suppose such an argument would have with me?”

The cool, ironic little question, with its insolent indifference, checked him like the flick of a lash across the face.  He turned away.

“None, I suppose,” he admitted bitterly.  “You are fire and flame—­but within, you are ice.”

“Yes,” she said, almost as though to herself.  “Within, I’m ice.  I believe that’s true.”

“True!” he repeated.  “Of course it’s true.  If it were not——­”

A slight smile tilted her mouth.

“Well?” she echoed.  “If it were not?”

He swung round.  With a quick stride he was beside her.  His eyes blazing with a sudden fury of passion and resentment, he caught her by the shoulders, forcing her to face him.