Hawke was on his mettle at last, and he brutally enjoyed the little tableau, when Hugh Fraser Johnstone impatiently tore open "Madame Berthe Louison's" note.

Hawke observed significantly that he had been shown into a small room, suited to semi-menial interviews.

The additional slight maddened him.

The clash of glasses and shouts of a gay crowd of military convives rose up in a merry chorus within.

Across that banquet hall's draped doors the thin, invisible barrier of "Coventry" shut out the bold social renegade.
"She'll have to wait, Hawke!" roughly said Hugh Johnstone, moving toward the door.
"By God! she shall not wait a minute, you damned old moneybags!" cried the ruined soldier, who had long forfeited his caste--his cherished rank.