have put an image of yourself there—given it them—and you have no right to take it away.'
He took a cigarette from a box near him.
' And you are not allowed to smoke,' she added.
He laughed and lit it.
' We have got to talk,' he said. ' If you convince me I have no right to—well, to commit what will probably be a very lengthy suicide, I will smoke no more. If you don't, I shall continue to smoke, and in the interval I can talk more easily. Now you have spoken so frankly to me, I shall use the same frankness.'
She nodded.
' A man's life,' he said, ' belongs to himself until he has given it to a woman, and she has accepted it. Then it is no longer his, but hers, and she may dispose of it. No woman has accepted mine.'
She made a little movement in her chair, as if wincing, and he saw it.
' Shall I not go on?' he said.
' No, go on; it is this for which I came here.'
' So everybody,' said he, ' has about the same weight with me, and that combined weight is less than my right to do as I choose. Bertie Keynes, you, Judy, Ginger—you all want me to be what you call sensible, and live as long as possible. But my indifference to life is stronger than your desire that I should live. My mother alone wishes me to do as I choose, because she understands.'
He paused, and saw that Sybil was looking, not at him, but into the fire, and that unshed tears stood in her eyes, fighting with some emotion that would not let them fall.
' I understand too,' she said in a whisper; and it looked as if the tears would have their way. Then they were checked again as she continued: ' But you are grossly unfair to me—both you and Judy. You saddle me with this responsibility. You say it is my fault that you
