"Thank you." She was twisting her glass around and around in her hands, the only sign that her calmness was something of a facade.

He made no attempt to continue the conversation. He wanted to see if there would be any other crack in her armor.

She continued to twist her glass, setting one palm against the base while she did so. She raised her eyes to his mouth, drew breath as if she would speak, but said nothing. She lifted her glass to her mouth to drink, though he did not believe her lips touched the liquid.

"Excuse me," she said finally. "Please excuse me."

It was only as his eyes followed her across the room that he realized that a great deal of attention was on them. She had probably realized it the whole time. That was good. He was not the least bit sorry. If she was embarrassed, good. It was a beginning.

He did not know quite when love had turned to hatred. Not for several months after her desertion, anyway. Disbelief had quickly turned to panic and a wild flight, first to the Lake District, and then to Scotland. Panic had turned to numbness, and numbness had finally given way to a deeply painful, almost debilitating heartbreak. For months he had dragged himself about on his walking tour, not wanting to get up in the mornings, not wanting to eat, not able to sleep, not wanting to live.

He had continued to get up in the mornings, he had continued to eat, he had slept when exhaustion claimed him. And eventually he had persuaded himself to go on living. He had done it by bringing himself deliberately to hate her, to hate her heartlessness and her contempt for honor and decency.

And yet hatred could be as destructive as heartbreak. He had found himself after his return to London hungry for news of her, going out of his way to acquire it-not easily done when she never came to town. He had found himself viciously satisfied when it became evident that Easton was returning to his old ways. She had preferred Easton to him. Let her live with the consequences.