"Madam the Princess, I noticed you were looking peeked."
"Oh! Well— Good night!"
Martin and Clif settled in large chairs in the drawing-room, and tried to play at being old friends happy in meeting. They did not look at each other.
After Clif had cursed a little and told three sound smutty stories, to show that he had not been spoiled and that he had been elegant only to delight Joyce, he flung:
"Huh! So that is that, as the Englishers remark. Well, I could see your Old Lady didn't cotton to me. She was just as chummy as an iceberg. But gosh, I don't mind. She's going to have a kid, and of course women, all of 'em, get cranky when they're that way. But—"
He hiccuped, looked sage, and bolted his fifth cognac.
"But what I never could figure out— Mind you, I'm not criticizing the Old Lady. She's as swell as they make 'em. But what I can't understand is how after living with Leora, who was the real thing, you can stand a hoity-toity skirt like Joycey!"
Then Martin broke.
The misery of not being able to work, these months since Terry had gone, had gnawed at him.
"Look here, Clif. I won't have you discuss my wife. I'm sorry she doesn't please you, but I'm afraid that in this particular matter—"
Clif had risen, not too steadily, though his voice and his eyes were resolute.
"All right. I figured out you were going to high-hat me. Of course I haven't got a rich wife to slip me money. I'm just a plain old hobo. I don't belong in a place like this. Not smooth enough to be a butler. You are. All right. I wish you luck. And meanwhile you can go plumb to hell, my young friend!"
Martin did not pursue him into the hall.
As he sat alone he groaned, "Thank Heaven, that operation's over!"
He told himself that Clif was a crook, a fool, and a fat waster; he told himself that Clif was a cynic without wisdom, a drunkard without charm, and a philanthropist who was generous only because it larded his vanity. But these admirable truths did not keep the operation from hurting any more than it would have eased the removal of an appendix to be told
