ith
emotion.

"Oh! You told me? I forget."

"Naturally Monsieur Gilman is rich. I am not rich, though I shall be. But
you can't wait," Musa sneered.

"I do not know what you mean," said Audrey.

"Ah!" said Musa. "Once I told you that Tommy and Nick lent me the money
with which to live. For me, since then, you have never been the same being.
How stupid I was to tell you! You could not comprehend such a thing. Your
soul is too low to comprehend it. Permit me to say that I have already
repaid Nick. And at the first moment I shall repay Tommy. My position is
secure. I have only to wait. But you will not wait. You are a bourgeoise
of the most terrible sort. Opulence fascinates you. Mr. Gilman has
opulence. He has nothing else. But he has opulence, and for you that is
all."

In an instant her indifference, self-control, wisdom vanished. It was a sad
exhibition of frailty; but she enjoyed it, she revelled in it, giving play
to everything in herself that was barbaric. The marsh around them was
probably as it had been before the vikings had sailed into it, and Audrey
rushed back with inconceivable speed into the past and became the primeval
woman of twenty centuries earlier. Like almost all women she possessed this
wondrous and affrighting faculty.

"You are telling a wicked untruth!" she exploded in English. "And what's
more, you know you are. You disgust me. You know as well as I do I don't
care anything for money--anything. Only you're a horrid, spoilt beast. You
think you can upset me, but you can't. I won't have it, either from you or
from anybody else. It's a shame, that's what it is. Now you've got to
apologise to me. I absolutely insist on it. You aren't going to bully me,
even if you think you are. I'll soon show you the sort of girl I am, and
you make no mistake! Are you going to apologise or aren't you?"

The indecorous creature was breathing as loudly as Mr. Gilman himself.

"I admit it," said Musa yielding.

"Ah!"

"I demand your pardon. I knew that what I said was not true. I am outside
myself. But what would you? It is stronger than I. This existence is
terrible, on the yacht. I cannot support it. I shall become mad. I am
ruined. My jealousy is intolerable."

"It is!" said Audrey, using French again, more calmly, having returned to
the twentieth century.

"It is intolerable to me." Then Musa's voice changed and grew persuasive,
rather like a child's. "I cannot live without you. That is the truth. I