“I see.  You want to be off with the old love before you are on with the new.”

“Nothing of the kind, I assure you.”

“What!  Not even the new?”

“Oh, that part!” He smiled and followed her up.  “You won’t mind my going soon?”

“The sooner the better if you talk like that!” She threw open the door of her little sitting-room.  How well the Show was going!

“A soda and whisky, Colonel?  I suppose that’s your idea of tea.”  She had the scene ready.  She had got it all up like a little play, writing down the articles on a sheet of paper headed “Property List”:  “Cigars, cigarettes, syphons, spirits, sporting-papers,” all borrowed from Master Harold Lee Carter to entertain a visitor.

But at the height of the play’s prosperity, while the Colonel clinked tumblers with Nelly, came a contretemps, and all the farce darkened swiftly to drama as the gay landscape is overgloomed by a thundercloud.

It all came from Mrs. Lee Carter’s benevolent fussiness, her interest in the man who had come to marry her governess.  A servant knocked at the door, stuck her head in, and said, “Mrs. Lee Carter’s compliments, and would you like some tea?”

“No, thank you,” said Eileen, hurriedly.

But as the door closed, the Colonel’s glass fell to the ground, and he rose to his feet.  His bronzed face was working wildly.

“Mrs. Lee Carter!” he gasped.  “You—­you are Eileen!”

“Here’s a mess,” she said coolly, stooping to wipe up the carpet.

“Eileen!  Explain!” he said piteously.

“It’s you that ought to be explaining.  I’ve all I can do to pick up the nasty little bits of glass.”

“My brain reels.  Who are you?  What are you?  For God’s sake.”

“Hush!  Who are you?  What are you?”

“I know what I was—­your lover.”

“Whose?  Mine or Nelly’s?”

“Good God, Eileen!  You saw how anxious I was to get to you.  That I was subtly drawn to Nelly is only a proof of how you were in my blood.  But you’re not really Nelly O’Neill.  This is some stupid practical joke.  Don’t torture me longer.”

“It tortures you that I should be Nelly O’ Neill!” All the confessed sweetness of her position came up into clear consciousness:  the lights, the laughter, the very smell of the smoke endeared by a thousand triumphs.  How dared he speak of Nelly O’Neill as though she couldn’t be touched with a pitchfork!  Yes, and Bob Maper, too—­her anger ricocheted to him—­with his priggish notions of saving her from black bogs!  And who was it that now stood over her like a fuddled accusing angel?  She pulled out his letter and read viciously:—­

  “’A night of memories and of sighs
    I consecrate to thee.’”

“I was dying to rush to you—­you wouldn’t see me.  And the Major dragged me—­”

“Through all that mud?  All those Indian escapades?”