Follow a Stranger

nobody, and followed him, leaving the door ajar.

He stood by her dressing-table, looking down, his fingers

lightly touching the lids of cosmetic jars, perfume bottles,

her hairbrush. She waited, a few feet away, looking at the

back of his dark head.

Then he seemed to jerk himself together, turned and

looked at her, his face unreadable.

“I am sorry about that incident on the beach,” he said

formally. “I lost my temper.”

“You blame me for Jean-Paul,” she said quietly. “You’re

wrong. You should never have agreed to that arrangement,

you know. It’s that that has been at the bottom of the

trouble with Pallas all the time—she felt she was under

pressure, being forced to marry him.”

“Arranged marriages work very well,” he said de-

fensively, “and I am certain Pallas liked Jean-Paul very

much. I should never have sent her to school in England. It

has given her crazy ideas.”

She flushed. “Like falling in love and choosing whom one

marries?”

“Exactly so,” he retorted. “You chose whom you should

marry, and see what a mess you have made of your life!”

“You have no right to say that!” she said angrily.

“Isn’t it true?” he asked thickly. “Can you deny that Peter

Hardy is selfish and indifferent to you? All he thinks of is

his work. He doesn’t love you. He probably never has—or

only for a short while. I do not suppose he will ever fall in

love with anyone. He is too self-obsessed.”

“You mustn’t say this to me,” she said weakly, unable to

deny what had become obvious to her with every day that