"If she sees me she won't talk," he said, coolly. "I'm one of her exempts----"
"Let her see us both. I tell you she never talks about me, or anybody with whom I happen to be. It's the best way to avoid gossip, Elena----"
"I don't want to risk it, Jim! Please don't! I'm in abject terror of that woman----"
But Desboro had already stepped out to the box, and his keen, amused eyes very soon discovered the levelled glasses of Mrs. Hammerton.
"Certainly. I want her to see you. That's it! That's enough. She won't say a word about you now."
Mrs. Clydesdale shrank back into the dim, rosy half-light of the box; Desboro looked down at Mrs. Hammerton and smiled; then rejoined his flushed companion.
"Don't worry; Aunt Hannah's fangs are extracted for this evening. Elena, you are looking pretty enough to endanger the record of an aged saint! There goes that meaningless overture! What is it you have to say to me?"
"I'm not. But I don't want the Barkleys and their guests to find us here together."
"Oh, Lord!" he said impatiently. "You always did care for anything that is just out of reach when you stand on tip-toe. You always were that way, Elena. When we were free to see each other you would have none of me."
She was looking down while he spoke, smoothing one silken knee with her white-gloved hand. After a moment, she lifted her head. To his surprise, her eyes were brilliant with unshed tears.
"You don't love me any more, do you, Jim?"
"I--I have--it is about as it always will be with me. Circumstances have altered things."
He thought for a moment, and his eyes grew sombre.
"Jim! Are you going to marry somebody?" she said suddenly.
He looked up with a startled laugh, not entirely agreeable.
"Why do you say that? Is it because of what you know about marriages--like mine?"
She mentioned several among people both knew. He smiled. Then she said, wearily:
"There are plenty of decent people and decent marriages in the world. The people we play with are no good. It's only restlessness, idleness, and discontent that kills everything among people of our sort. I know I'm that way, too. But I don't believe I would be if I had married you."
"Why? Don't you believe any marriage can be happy?"
"Elena, have you ever heard of a honeymoon that lasts? Do you know how long any two people can endure each other without merciful assistance from a third? Don't you know that, sooner or later, any two people ever born are certain to talk each other out--pump each other dry--love each other to satiation--and ultimately recoil, each into the mysterious seclusion of its own individuality, from whence it emerged temporarily in order that the human race might not perish from the earth!"