"You misunderstand, I didn't call on Bivens. He came to see me."

"And you refused! Oh, Jim, don't tell me you were so foolish!"

"I'm sorry to disappoint you, dear, but I had to--that's all."

The girl dropped into her seat with a sigh, while he went on:

"My interview with Bivens led to a most important and embarrassing discovery."

"Embarrassing--what do you mean? He offered you the position?"

"Yes, and finally confessed that he did it wholly to please you."

Nan's figure suddenly straightened.

"Indeed! I'm glad to hear that my wishes find favour somewhere!"

"Bivens further confided in me the fact that he is hopelessly and desperately in love with you."

A flash of anger mantled Nan's cheeks.

"That will do, Jim," she said in quiet cold tones. "Your joke has gone far enough."

"Joke! Do you think I could joke on such a subject?"

A smile began to play about the corners of the full lips.

"You don't mean it--really?"

"Certainly. He told me so in the plainest sort of blunt English. And you mean to say that you have not suspected it?"

"I never dreamed he was so easy!" Still smiling dreamily Nan crossed her hands over her knees and studied the pattern in the rug, ignoring the presence of her lover.

"Then you underestimate your powers."

"Evidently."

Her eyes were laughing again mischievously.

"Let's not joke, Nan. It's too serious."

"Serious! I fail to see it."

"Can't you see that we must at once announce our engagement?"

The girl's lips curled with the faintest suggestion of sarcasm.

"I don't see it at all. You may be a good lawyer, but I fail to follow your logic."

Stuart rose with a gesture of anger.

"Come to the point, Nan. Let's not beat the devil around the stump any longer. You know as well as I do that you've been trying to flirt with this little insect----"

"Trying to flirt?"

"Yes."

"Trying? Don't you think I could if I wished without bungling the effort? What a poor opinion you hold of my talent."

"You know in your heart of hearts you despise Bivens."

"On the contrary, I vastly admire him. The man who can enter with his handicap this big heartless city and successfully smash the giants who oppose him is not an insect. I'd rather call him a hero. All women admire success."

"I see," Stuart replied with suppressed fury, "you enjoy your conquest."

"And why not?" she drawled, with lazy indifference.

"It's disgusting!"

Nan fixed her dark eyes on Stuart.

"How dare you use such a word to me?"

"Because it's true and you know it."

"True or false, you can't say it"--she rose deliberately--"you may go now!"

"Forgive me, dear," Stuart stammered in a queer muffled voice. "I didn't mean to hurt you. I was mad with jealousy."

"You may go," was the hard even answer.

"I can't go like this, dearest," he pleaded. "You must forgive me--you must! Look at me!"

She turned slowly, stared him full in the face for a moment without the quiver of an eyelid, her fine figure tense, erect, cold, as she quietly said:

"You are tiring me, Jim."

For an instant an impulse of overwhelming anger mastered him. He returned her look with one of concentrated rage and their eyes met in the first supreme clash of wills. For a moment he saw the world red, and caught in its glare something he had never seen in Nan before, a conscious cruelty and a joy in her power that was evil--a cruelty that could spring only from the deepest and most merciless self-worship. For the first time he saw a cold-blooded calculation behind her beautiful eyes, caught its accent in the richly modulated voice, and felt it in the smile which showed the white teeth--the smile of a woman who would pause at nothing to get what she wanted. The old savage impulse to strangle surged through his veins, and he was startled into the consciousness of his situation by the fierce grip of his finger nails in his fists clinched so tight they began to cut the flesh.

A blush of shame tinged his face as he tremblingly said:

"Please, dear, let's not part like this! I've suffered enough to-day.

You're only teasing me. And I've acted like a fool. Say that you forgive me!"

"Our engagement is at an end, Mr. Stuart," was the quiet answer.

"Nan----"

Before he could recover from the shock or utter a protest, she opened the door and he had passed out into the night.