"Look here," I said, "let's go back to your studio. If you've
made a fool of yourself you must eat humble pie. Your wife
doesn't strike me as the sort of woman to bear malice."
"How can I go back to the studio?" he said wearily.
"They're there. I've left it to them."
"Then it's not your wife who's left you; it's you who've left
your wife."
"For God's sake don't talk to me like that."
Still I could not take him seriously. I did not for a moment
believe what he had told me. But he was in very real distress.
"Well, you've come here to talk to me about it. You'd better
tell me the whole story."
"This afternoon I couldn't stand it any more. I went to
Strickland and told him I thought he was quite well enough to
go back to his own place. I wanted the studio myself."
"No one but Strickland would have needed telling," I said.
"What did he say?"
"He laughed a little; you know how he laughs, not as though he
were amused, but as though you were a damned fool, and said
he'd go at once. He began to put his things together.
You remember I fetched from his room what I thought he needed,
and he asked Blanche for a piece of paper and some string to
make a parcel.
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