"But she may ask me, Nick," Olga objected.
"If she does, you must lie to her," he said inexorably.
Olga abandoned the discussion somewhat reluctantly, anticipating difficulties.
He laid his hand for an instant on her arm as she prepared to enter. "You understand I am in earnest, don't you?" he said.
She looked into his queer, yellow face with a feeling that was almost awe as she answered meekly. "Yes, Nick."
"And don't forget it," he said, as he let her go.
"Is that you, Allegro? There is no one with you?"
Violet raised herself from her pillows, turning a haggard face to meet her friend. She looked as if years had passed over her. Her great eyes shone out of dark circles. They looked beyond Olga in evident apprehension.
"It's only me, darling," said Olga, going swiftly to her.
Feverish hands caught and held her. "Goodness, child! How cold you are!" exclaimed Violet. "Mrs. Briggs, I can do without you now. You had better go and look after Briggs." She broke into a brief laugh. "He always gets up to mischief as soon as your back is turned."
"He can very well look after 'imself," said Mrs. Briggs austerely. "And I'm not a-goin' to leave you like this, my dearie. But I'll tell you what I will do. I'll go down to the kitchen and make them lazy hussies stir themselves and get you a meal of some sort."
In the days when Mrs. Briggs had been Violet's nurse she had reigned supreme in the Priory kitchen, and she still regarded it as an outlying portion of her dominions.
Violet leaned back upon her pillows with exhaustion written plainly on her pale face. "Oh, do as you like, Nanny! But I don't want anything. I've got my cigarettes."
Mrs. Briggs grunted, and turned to go. The patient Cork here seized the opportunity to assert himself, and gently but firmly pressed into the room.
"Leave him alone!" Violet commanded. "He knows how to take care of me."
As Cork was fully determined to enter, no effort on Mrs. Briggs's part would have availed to stop him, and Mrs. Briggs, realizing this, sniffed and departed.
The huge animal lay down by the foot of the bed and heaved a sigh of satisfaction as he dropped his nose upon his paws.
And then Violet turned her face to Olga, sitting on the bed, and whispered, "Does he know?"