“Oh, Bob, youve killed me.  How could you?” Then, with a suspiciously sudden recovery of energy, she screamed “Bijou Theatre.  Drive on, will you” up at the cabman, who was looking down through the trapdoor.  The horse plunged forward, and, with the jolt, she was fawning on Marmaduke’s arm again, saying, “Dont be brutal to me any more, Bob.  I cant bear it.  I have enough trouble without your turning on me.”

He was young and green, and too much confused by this time to feel sure that he had not been the aggressor.  But he did, on the whole, the wisest thing—­folded his arms and sat silent, with his cheeks burning.

“Say something to me,” she said, shaking his arm.  “I have nothing to say,” he replied.  “I shall leave town for home to-night.  I cant shew my face again after this.”

“Home,” she said, in her former contemptuous tone, flinging his arm away.  “That means your cousin Constance.”

“Who told you about her?”

“Never mind.  You are engaged to her.”

“You lie!”

Susanna was shaken.  She looked hard at him, wondering whether he was deceiving her or not.  “Look me in the face, Bob,” she said.  If he had complied, she would not have believed him.  But he treated the challenge with supreme disdain and stared straight ahead, obeying his male instinct, which taught him that the woman, with all the advantages on her side, would nevertheless let him win if he held on.  At last she came caressingly to his shoulder again, and said: 

“Why didnt you tell me about her yourself?”

“Damn it all,” he exclaimed, violently, “there is nothing to tell!  I am not engaged to her:  on my oath I am not.  My people at home talk about a match between us as if it were a settled thing, though they know I dont care for her.  But if you want to have the truth, I cant afford to say that I wont marry her, because I am too hard up to quarrel with the governor, who has set his heart on it.  You see, the way I am circumstanced——­”

“Oh, bother your circumstances!  Look here, Bob, I dont want you to introduce me to your swell relations; it is not worth my while to waste time on people who cant earn their own living.  And never mind your governor:  we can get on without him.  If you are hard up for money, and he is stingy, you had better get it from me than from the Jews.”

“I couldnt do that,” said Marmaduke, touched.  “In fact, I am well enough off.  By the bye, I must not forget to pay you for that lunch.  But if I ever am hard up, I will come to you.  Will that do?”

“Of course:  that is what I meant.  Confound it, here we are already.  You mustnt come in, you would only be in the way.  Come to-night after the burlesque, if you like.  Youre not angry with me, are you?”

Her breast touched his arm just then; and as if she had released some spring, all his love for her suddenly surged up within him and got the better of him.  “Wait—­listen,” he said, in a voice half choked with tenderness.  “Look here, Lalage:  the honest truth is that I shall be ruined if I marry you openly.  Let us be married quietly, and keep it dark until I am more independent.”