"You are still glad that you ran off with him to live _tête-à-tête_ in a
bridal cottage?"
"Oh, I suppose so. Yes, certainly!"
His frank face betrayed that the topic was unwelcome to him. For he
hated all secrets, and this secret, from this girl, was particularly
obnoxious to him. And beyond all that part of it, how could he analyze
for anybody his periods of strong revolt against his association with
Henry G. Surface, followed by longer and stranger periods when, quite
apart from the fact that his word was given and regrets were vain, his
consciousness embraced it as having a certain positive value?
He rose restlessly, and in rising his eye fell upon the little clock on
the mantel.
"Good heavens!" broke from him. "I had no idea it was so late! I must go
directly. Directly."
"Oh, no, you mustn't think of it. Your visit to me has just begun--all
this time you have been calling on Beverley Byrd."
"Why do you think I came here to-night?" he asked abruptly.