Ashton echoed Esther’s words hoarsely.

“Here! With you! in Paris!... Micky–––”

A wave of bitterest jealousy surged through him. He fell back a step, struck dumb by the force of his emotions, and Esther fled away from him down the street.

She seemed to have awakened all at once to her true position. She was alone, with only a few shillings in her pocket and in a strange city.

She was tired to death. She felt as if her limbs would give way beneath her. The driver of a fiacre looked at her and drew his horse to the kerb.

Esther nodded; she threw her suit-case on to the seat and clambered in after it.

But where to go? The old blinding fear of her loneliness rushed back. Where could she go?

Then she suddenly remembered the hotel from which Micky had written to her. She would go there. It would be somewhere at least to sleep and rest.

It was only a little drive to the hotel; she wished it had been longer.

A commissionaire came forward, and said something in French. She looked up at him, but his face seemed all indistinct and unreal. She tried to answer, but her own voice sounded as if it were miles away.

They were in the small, rather dreary lounge. Esther passed a hand across her eyes. She must conquer this absurd weakness. She forced herself to remember that she was alone, but she felt as if she had no will-power left.

A door in front of her opened suddenly, and a man came into the lounge.

When he saw Esther he stopped. The hot colour rushed to his face. He seemed to be waiting for some sign from her. For a moment their eyes met; then, hardly knowing what she did, Esther held out her hand.

“Oh, please,” she said faintly, “oh, please tell me––what I am to do?”

But for the next few minutes she was past remembering anything, though she never really lost consciousness. She only knew that everything was all right now Micky was here––and the sheer relief the knowledge brought with it for the time threw her into a sort of apathy.

Some one took off her hat and the big fur coat that had grown so heavy; some one had bathed her face and unlaced her shoes, and now Micky stood there looking down at her with eyes that hurt, though they smiled.

“I’ve told them to bring lunch in here,” he went on. “You’ll like it better than the public room––and I haven’t had mine yet.”

Esther looked up at him.

“And can we––can we go back to London to-day?” she asked.

“We can go any time you like,” he said.

He felt he had aged years during that morning. No sooner had Esther got out of his sight at the station than he was beside himself with remorse for having allowed her to go; he had spent the whole morning wandering about looking for her. He had been to this hotel a dozen times; he had only just come in again when she followed.

The relief of having her safely in his charge once more was almost more than he could bear. He walked over to the door, then stopped and looked back at her.

“You won’t ... you won’t run away from me again, will you?” he asked. For the first time there was real emotion in his voice.

Esther had been sitting looking into the fire; she raised her head now.

“Don’t go,” she said tremulously. “Please don’t go. I want to speak to you.”

He flushed crimson, he tried to make some excuse.

“Another time.... You’re tired. I’ll come back presently. You ought to get some rest if we’re to go back to-night.”

“No,” she said. “It must be now.”

He shut the door, but he kept as far away from her as possible, standing over by the window that looked into the dreary winter garden.

There was something implacable about his tall figure.

“Oh, won’t you come here?” she said.

He obeyed at once. He rested an elbow on the mantelshelf and kept his eyes fixed on the fire.

There as a little silence, then Esther said, almost in a whisper:

“I want to beg your pardon. I hope you will––will try and forgive me.”

Micky did not move.

She struggled on:

“I’ve seen ... Mr. Ashton.” Somehow she could not bring herself to speak of him by his Christian name.

“And I know––I know––that I’ve been––been a fool.”

Her voice broke. She gripped the arms of the chair hard to keep herself from breaking down.

Micky forced himself to speak.

“I’m glad you’ve seen him––as you wished it,” he said jerkily. “But as hoping I will forgive you, there’s nothing to forgive––it’s all the other way on. I behaved like––like a cad––it’s for you to forgive me.”

He smiled faintly.

“And now we’ve both said the right thing I’ll go and see about that train,” he said.

But again she stopped him.

“I don’t want you to go––I want to talk to you. I want ... oh, I don’t know what I do want!” she finished, with a sob.

“You’re tired out,” Micky said calmly, though he 257 looked anything but calm, “and I’m going to bully you and insist that you rest. I’ll come back presently....”

He went away quickly, as if he were afraid of being kept against his will but outside the door he stood still for a moment with his hand over his eyes before he pulled himself together and went on.

Esther listened to his departing steps with a sinking at her heart.

What had she hoped for? She hardly knew, but she felt as if she had made an overture of friendship that had been kindly but decidedly refused.

Her cheeks burned. It was not what she had expected.

It seemed an eternity till Micky came back again.

“There’s a train in half an hour,” he told her. “We can get back to town very comfortably. I’ve wired to June to meet us. She probably came up from Enmore yesterday.”

June! Esther had almost forgotten June.

“You ought to be getting ready if we are to catch that train,” Micky said. “Would you rather stay till to-morrow? I’m afraid the journey will tire you dreadfully.”

She rose hurriedly.

“No, no––oh no, I’d much rather go!”

Micky had reserved a carriage.

“I think I will go in a smoker,” he said. He put some magazines and a box of chocolates on the seat; he avoided looking at her. “It’s a corridor train so I’ll come and see that you are all right occasionally––if I may.”

She did not answer; she felt a little chill of disappointment. He had not asked a single question about Raymond, and now he was suggesting that they travel the long journey separately.

He hesitated.

“Will you be all right?” he asked awkwardly.

“Yes, thank you.”

He went away, and presently the train started. Esther looked out of the window and watched the city as it was rapidly left behind.

“I never want to see it again,” was the thought in her heart. “I wish I never had seen it.”

She felt like a naughty child who has run away from home and is being ignominiously brought back.

Last night seemed like some fevered dream; Raymond Ashton some man of whom she had read in a book or seen in a play.

A phantom lover!––he had not even been that, and once she had wished to die because she had got to be separated from him.

Her eyes fell on her hand––she still wore his ring.

With sudden passion she dragged it from her finger; she let the window down with a run and flung the ring far out into the grey evening. It was the end of a dream; the final uprooting of an illusion.