took up a stand behind the piano and laughed at
him. "You're an artist, Gilbert," she said. "It's all very well for you
to practice on women of your own age, but I'm an unsophisticated girl.
You might turn my head, you know."

Her sarcasm threw him up short. She was mocking. He was profoundly
hurt. "But you've chosen me. You've picked me out. You've used me to
take you to places night after night! Don't fool with me, Joan. I'm in
dead earnest."

And she saw with astonishment that he was. His face was white, and he
stood in a curious attitude of supplication, with his hands out. She
was amazed, and for a moment thrilled. Gilbert Palgrave, the woman's
man, in love with her. Think of it!

"But Gilbert," she said, "there's Alice. She's my friend." That seemed
to matter more than the fact that she was his wife.

"That hasn't mattered to you all along. Why drag it in now? Night after
night you've danced with me; I've been at your beck and call; you used
me to rescue you from Gray that time. What are you? What are you made
of? Unsophisticated! You!" He wasn't angry. He was fumbling at reasons
in order to try and get at her point of view. "You know well enough
that a man doesn't put himself out to that extent for nothing. What
becomes of give and take? Do you conceive that you are going to sail
through life taking everything and giving nothing?"

Martin had asked her this, and Alice, and now here was Gilbert Palgrave
putting it to her as though it were an indictment! "But I'm a kid," she
cried out. "What do you all mean? Can't I be allowed to have any fun
without paying for it? I'm only just out of the shell. I've only been
living for a few weeks. Can't you see that I'm a kid? I have the right
to take all I can get for nothing,--the right of youth. What do you
mean--all of you?"

She came out from behind the piano and stood in front of him, as erect
as a silver birch, and as slim and young. There was a great indignation
all about her.

His eager hands went out, and fell. He was not a brute. It would be
cowardly to touch this amazing child. She was armed with fearlessness
and virginity--and he had mistaken these things for callousness.

"I don't know what to say," he said. "You stagger me. How long are you
going to hide behind this youthfulness? When are you going to be old
enough to be honest? Men have patience only up to a point. At any rate,
you didn't claim youth when Gray asked you to marry him--though you may
ha