wanted him to be conciliatory. She said she wanted to have a man on show as escort. Well then, an escort got something. . . . At just this moment he was beginning again with:
"Look here . . . will you let me come to your room to-night or will you not?"
She burst into high, loud laughter. He said:
"Damn it all, it isn't any laughing matter! . . . Look here! You don't know what I risk. . . . There are A.P.M.'s and P.M.'s and deputy sub-acting A.P.M.'s walking about the corridors of all the hotels in this town, all night long. . . . It's as much as my job is worth. . . . "
She put her handkerchief to her lips to hide a smile that she knew would be too cruel for him not to notice. And even when she took it away, he said:
"Hang it all, what a cruel-looking fiend you are! . . . . Why the devil do I hang around you? . . . There's a picture that my mother's got, by Burne-Jones . . . A cruel-looking woman with a distant smile . . . Some vampire . . . La belle Dame sans Merci . . . That's what you're like."
She looked at him suddenly with considerable seriousness. . . .
"See here, Potty . . . " she began. He groaned:
"I believe you'd like me to be sent to the beastly trenches. . . . Yet a big, distinguished-looking chap like me wouldn't have a chance. . . . At the first volley the Germans fired, they'd pick me off. . . . "
"Oh, Potty," she exclaimed, "try to be serious for a minute. . . . I tell you I'm a woman who's trying . . . who's desperately wanting . . . to be reconciled to her husband! . . . I would not tell that to another soul. . . . I would not tell it to myself. . . . But one
