tin upon the cupboard shelf, and carried the cocoa to Gaga.

"That cocoa?" she demanded. "It's all mixed up with poison and stuff.
Don't want to _kill_ you."

Gaga, by this time in bed, looked at the cocoa, and proclaimed its
reality.

"Yes ... that's ... co ... cocoa," he stammered.

There was a pause of some minutes while the cocoa was mixed; and they
both drank it slowly, Sally conscious, as its warmth stole through her
body, that she was less extremely unhappy than she had been. She felt a
little better. She even kissed Gaga in wishing him goodnight, and
received his eager kisses in return without flinching. At last she too
went to her bed in the adjoining room, and undressed and lay down in the
darkness. From where she lay Sally could hear Gaga moving, and could see
the glimmer of the light in his room which would burn until the morning.
And as she lay there all her tragic thoughts came flooding back with the
intensity of a nightmare. The horrors, for a short time repelled, were
stronger than ever. She was tensely awake. Every word exchanged between
Toby and herself came ringing into her head. She was aghast at the
stupidity, the cruel and brutal stupidity, of her lover. He her lover!
Love! why he didn't know what love meant! He would take everything she
had to give; and when he was asked to stand by her Toby would repudiate
her claim upon him. She was filled with vicious hatred at his betrayal.
That was what men were! That was what they did! Shirkers! They were all
like that, except when they were ridiculous half-men like Gaga. What was
she to do? What _could_ she do? Her brain became very clear and active.
It was working with painful alertness, so rapidly that she often did not
reach the end of one channel before she was embarked upon another. Toby
was hopeless. She must act by herself. And what could she do?

Supposing she could do nothing? Disgrace, failure.... She was
frightened. Better anything than disclosure so ignominious. She thought
of Gaga: very well, there was still time. He would be better soon, and
once he was better she could easily persuade him that he was the father
of her baby. That was the simplest plan, and one which had been so much
taken for granted that she had not taken it sufficiently into account as
the only safe course. Gaga could be deceived because he had no suspicion
of all that went on in her mind, or of anything that had happened in her
life. He would soon be better, and when o