"Oh, Jack, it's great to see you!" Juliet said, when a too-attentive waiter had finished taking their order. Tears suddenly welled to her eyes. She dived into a gorgeous gold mesh bag for a handkerchief, which was not there. "Must be lost!" she sniffed. Hastily Jack passed his across the table, and had a heart-piercing impression that he had lived through this scene before, in happier days. But yes, of course! Often, when he was a big boy and she was a little girl, she had come to him for consolation. And she had always lost her "hanky!" It was then, when he was about sixteen, and she eleven, that he had first begun to love her, with a protecting love that had changed but never waned as the years passed. Now she belonged to another man. Yet she still called to him, across the gulf marriage had made, for help and comfort! Jack Manners wondered what had happened to his red blood, that the pain he suffered was not more acute.
"I'm too sorry for the child to think of myself just now," he diagnosed his feelings, with the picture of Pavoya in his mind. "The reaction will come by and by."
Juliet began at once to pour out her woes, forgetting to ask what had happened during Jack's visit to the house--what her husband had said, or whether the pearls had come.
"Pat doesn't love me," she broke out. "That's why I'm miserable. I don't know how to live. And I wouldn't have believed it if any one had told me--except himself."
"You don't mean that Claremanagh says----" Jack began to blunder; but Juliet cut him short. "Not in _words_, of course. But I found a letter from that devil, Pavoya. It began, 'My Best and Dearest Friend'. Isn't that the same thing as telling me? The woman wouldn't write to him like that if he didn't encourage her."
Jack longed to comfort the girl; but after what he had seen, he was at a loss for consoling words. "How did you happen to find the letter?" he temporized.
"Why, it had to do with the fuss about Pat's seal ring," the girl confessed. "But first, I'd better explain that when I was being married, I made firm resolutions never to mention the name of Pavoya to Pat. Emmy West almost _dared_ me to! And that alone was enough to show me it would be a silly mistake. But one night after we'd come to New York and were settling down happily, we had an exciting, intimate sort of talk about our pasts. It was a _beautiful_ talk! And I felt so sure of Pat, I just couldn't resist asking if he'd ever loved Pavoya. He swore he hadn't; he'd only admired her a lot, and flirted a little. It was nothing at all beside what he felt for _me_. He was so dear that I burst out about how nasty Emmy West and other people had been--how unhappy they'd made me, more than once. Pat said '_Damn_ Emmy West and all the cats!' I _loved_ that! And while the mood was on, I asked if he were willing to promise he'd not see Pavoya in New York.