Her husband
never questioned her outlay, but on the other hand it was expedient to
be armed against the possibility of his doing so, and Rita's debts
were accumulating formidably.
Then there was Margaret Halley to consider. Rita had never hitherto
given her confidence to anyone who was not addicted to the same
practices as herself, and she frequently experienced embarrassment
beneath the grave scrutiny of Margaret's watchful eyes. In another
this attitude of gentle disapproval would have been irritating, but
Rita loved and admired Margaret, and suffered accordingly.
As for Sir Lucien, she had ceased to understand him. An impalpable
barrier seemed to have arisen between them. The inner man had became
inaccessible. Her mind was not subtle enough to grasp the real
explanation of this change in her old lover. Being based upon wrong
premises, her inferences were necessarily wide of the truth, and she
believed that Sir Lucien was jealous of Margaret's cousin, Quentin
Gray.
Gray met Rita at Margaret Halley's flat shortly after he had returned
home from service in the East, and he immediately conceived a violent
infatuation for this pretty friend of his cousin's. In this respect
his conduct was in no way peculiar.
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