odd, fantastic figure.  She pauses in the doorway hesitatingly, then steadies herself and, with a defiant air, stalks into the bedroom.  Directly she has moved away, QUEX softly closes the door, locks it, and pockets the key.  Meanwhile SOPHY, looking about the bedroom for the DUCHESS, discovers the paper upon the bed.  She picks it up, reads it and replaces it, and, coming back into the boudoir, encounters QUEX.

SOPHY.

Oh!

QUEX.

[With a careless nod.] Ah?

SOPHY.

[Recovering herself, and speaking with a contemptuous smile.] So her Grace has packed herself off to Mrs. Eden’s room. [Firmly.] Who rang for me, please?

QUEX.

I rang.

SOPHY.

You? what for?

QUEX.

Oh, you and I are going to have a cosy little chat together.

SOPHY.

[Haughtily.] I don’t understand you.

QUEX.

We’ll understand one another well enough, in a minute.

[He lights another cigarette and seats himself upon the settee.  She moves to the back of a chair, eyeing him distrustfully.

QUEX.

Now then!  You’ve been at the key-hole, have you?

SOPHY.

[Slightly embarrassed.] Y—­yes.

QUEX.

[Sharply.] Eh?

SOPHY.

[Defiantly.] Yes; you know I have.

QUEX.

Ah.  And I should like to know a little more, while we are upon the delicate subject of spying.  When I found you behind the cypress-hedge this evening before dinner—­

SOPHY.

Well?

QUEX.

You had just at that moment returned to the Italian garden, you said.

SOPHY.

Yes, so I said.

QUEX.

As a matter of fact, you had been there some time, I presume?

SOPHY.

A minute or two.

QUEX.

Heard anything?

SOPHY.

[Laughing maliciously.] Ha, ha, ha!  I heard her Grace say, “to-night”—­[faintly mimicking the DUCHESS] “to-night!” [With a curl of the lip.] That was enough for me.

QUEX.

Quite so.  You told a deliberate lie, then, when I questioned you?

SOPHY.

Yes.

QUEX.

Earlier in the evening, that manicure game of yours—­nothing but a damned cunning trick, eh?

SOPHY.

I beg you won’t use such language.

QUEX.

A trick, eh?

SOPHY.

Certainly.

QUEX.

You wanted—­what did you want?

SOPHY.

[Disdainfully.] A kiss, or a squeeze of the waist—­anything of that sort would have done.

QUEX.

Oh, would it?  You didn’t get what you wanted, though.

SOPHY.

No; I suppose you were frightened.