I don't want to remember."
Julian stood hesitating. He glanced at Cuckoo's hair and at the back of
her thin hand moving to and fro above the little contented dog.
"Why not?" he said.
At first she made no answer to this question, and seemed as if she had
not heard it, but presently it appeared that her silence had been caused
by the effect of consideration, for at length she said, still retaining
her aloof attitude:
"I don't want to remember, because it's like a beastly dream, and when I
remember I know it ain't a dream."
Julian said nothing, and suddenly Cuckoo turned round to him, and took
her hand from Jessie's back.
"I say. You were mad last night. Now, weren't you?"
The words came from her almost pleadingly, and her eyes rested on
Julian's insistently, as if demanding an affirmative.
"He'd made you mad," she continued.
"He," said Julian. "Who?"
"Your friend."
"Valentine! He had nothing to do with it."
"It was all his doing."
Her voice grew shrill with feeling.
"He's a devil," she said. "I hate him. I hate him worse than I hate
that copper west side of Regent Street. And I hate you, too,--yes, I
do,--to-day."
The tears gathered in her eyes and began to fall, tears of rage and shame
and regret, tears of one who had lost a great possession.
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