morning; it was no good
arguing with a man in Edward's condition.

Edward, indeed, did not know that she had gone. As soon as he awoke he
went straight to La Dolciquita's room and she stood him his lunch in her
own apartments. He fell on her neck and wept, and she put up with it for
a time. She was quite a good-natured woman. And, when she had calmed
him down with Eau de Melisse, she said: "Look here, my friend, how much
money have you left? Five thousand dollars? Ten?" For the rumour went
that Edward had lost two kings' ransoms a night for fourteen nights and
she imagined that he must be near the end of his resources.

The Eau de Melisse had calmed Edward to such an extent that, for the
moment, he really had a head on his shoulders. He did nothing more than
grunt:

"And then?"

"Why," she answered, "I may just as well have the ten thousand dollars
as the tables. I will go with you to Antibes for a week for that sum."

Edward grunted: "Five." She tried to get seven thousand five hundred;
but he stuck to his five thousand and the hotel expenses at Antibes. The
sedative carried him just as far as that and then he collapsed again. He
had to leave for Antibes at three; he could not do without it. He left a
note for Leonora saying that he had gone off for a week with the Clinton
Morleys, yachting.

He did not enjoy himself very much at Antibes. La Dolciquita could
talk of nothing with any enthusiasm except money, and she tired
him unceasingly, during every waking hour, for presents of the most
expensive description. And, at the end of a week, she just quietly
kicked him out. He hung about in Antibes for three days. He was cured
of the idea that he had any duties towards La Dolciquita--feudal or
otherwise. But his sentimentalism required of him an attitude of Byronic
gloom--as if his court had gone into half-mourning. Then his appetite
suddenly returned, and he remembered Leonora. He found at his hotel at
Monte Carlo a telegram from Leonora, dispatched from London, saying;
"Please return as soon as convenient." He could not understand why
Leonora should have abandoned him so precipitately when she only thought
that he had gone yachting with the Clinton Morleys. Then he discovered
that she had left the hotel before he had written the note. He had
a pretty rocky journey back to town; he was frightened out of his
life--and Leonora had never seemed so desirable to him.

V I CALL this the Saddest Story, rather than "The As