I could not hide my concern.  But there was no need to, for it flattered Claire’s vanity.  “No—­not yet, but he will.  I met him at Jack Taylor’s—­at a supper-party.”

“Did he know you were to be there?”

“No.  But he didn’t leave when he saw me.”

There was a pause.  I could not trust myself to say anything.  But Claire had no intention of leaving me curious.  “I don’t think he’s happy with her,” she remarked.

“What makes you say that?”

“Oh, several things.  I know him, you know.  He wouldn’t say he was.”

“Perhaps he didn’t want to discuss it with you.”

“Oh, no—­not that.  He isn’t reserved with me.”

“I should think it was dangerous to discuss one’s wife under such circumstances,” I laughed.

Claire laughed also.  “You should have heard what Jack had to say about his wife!  She’s down at Palm Beach.”

“She’d better come home,” I ventured.

“He was telling what a dance she leads him; she raises Cain if a woman looks at him—­and she damns every woman he meets before the woman has a chance to look.  Jack said marriage was hell—­just hell.  Reggie Channing thought it was like a pair of old slippers that you got used to.”  Jack laughed and answered, “You’re at the stage where you think you can solve the marriage problem by deceiving your wife!”

I made no comment.  Claire sat for a while, busy with her thoughts; then she repeated, “He wouldn’t say he was happy!  And he misses me, too.  When he was going, I held his hand, and said:  ’Well, Douglas, how goes it?’”

“And then?” I asked; but she would not say any more.

I waited a while, and then began, “Claire, let him alone.  Give them a chance to be happy.”

“Why should I?” she demanded, in a voice of hostility.

“She never harmed you,” I said.  I knew I was being foolish, but I would do what I could.

“She took him away from me, didn’t she?” And Claire’s eyes were suddenly alight with the hatred of her outcast class.  “Why did she get him?  Why is she Mrs. van Tuiver, and I nobody?  Because her father was rich, because she had power and position, while I had to scratch for myself in the world.  Is that true, or isn’t it?”

I could not deny that it might be part of the truth.  “But they’re married now,” I said, “and he loves her.”

“He loves me, too.  And I love him still, in spite of the way he’s treated me.  He’s the only man I ever really loved.  Do you think I’m going off and hide in a hole, while she spends his money and plays the princess up and down the Avenue?  Not much!”

I fell silent.  Should I set out upon another effort at “moulding water”?  Should I give Claire one more scolding—­tell her, perhaps, how her very features were becoming hard and ugly, as a result of the feelings she was harbouring?  Should I recall the pretences of generosity and dignity she had made when we first met?  I might have attempted this—­but something held me back.  After all, the one person who could decide this issue was Douglas van Tuiver.