her, too, that I'll not _stay_
different any longer than it can be helped. I am no dunce; I'll learn to
be her kind."

But, slipping away too happily into thoughts of how different she was
from everyone else in the whole world, beyond that he had not found it
easy to go. None too steadily he had decided to rely upon inspiration.
And now at the sight of her in a scant blue suit and tiny hat, bag in
hand before him, every last syllable of his rehearsals basely failed him.

He looked from her inquiring eyes to the stripped room. She believed she
understood that survey.

"Felicity's gone," she said in a voice that he hardly recognized as her
own. "She went with Dunham, the afternoon of the day you left for the
South. I did not tell you then because--"

It seemed too obvious, so she left it unsaid.

At that he reddened and was a little ashamed and humbler than ever at
heart. But he'd not thought of Felicity for weeks; he'd never thought of
her like this.

"Oh," was all he could manage. "Oh. And you--?"

She thought she understood his blankness.

"I was just going myself."

"Where?" He was suddenly afraid that it was too late for his plan,--that
it had always been too late.

"I don't know," she answered. "Home, maybe--where I used to live. It
doesn't much matter--anywhere."

Her eyes had not once left his face. And now he saw that they were as
changed as her voice. He would have said, had they been other than hers,
that they were bitter; no, not bitter; sardonic and mocking. Temporarily
like Felicity's. And she must be very tired, judging from her voice,
even more tired and wan than she looked.

The phrases which he had rehearsed deserted him treacherously.

"Then--then, why not come with me?" he labored over it. "I've a
drawing-room on the Lake Shore on the five o'clock. I knew about
Felicity; that wasn't why I came back. I came because I thought maybe we
could go out--you and I--and look around together."

He knew it was a poor thing of weak words and not what his inarticulate
heart would have uttered. Yet he was not prepared for her reception of
it.

She laughed up into his face, a hard little, crisp little laugh.

"Why not?" she said. "Why not?"

And when he took her in his arms and kissed her it was not as he had
dreamed it would be. Her body was slack, her lips not merely passive but
cold against his own. His heart heavy for reasons which he could not
name, he set her quickly