"Bubbles Dunster ?" he exclaimed.

"Good heavens, no! It's nothing to do with Bubbles." A look of uncontrollable relief came over her eyes and mouth.
"Who is it, Mark?
You credit me with a warmer heart than I possess--" But he remained silent, and she said quickly: "Come! Who is it, Mark ?" "Can't you guess ?" he asked harshly.

And, as she shook her head, he added, in a slow, reluctant tone: "I've always supposed you to be really attached to Lionel Varick." Lionel?
That was the last name she expected to hear! "I don't know exactly what you mean by 'attached,' Mark," she said coldly.

"But yes, I've always been fond of him--in a way I suppose you might call it 'attached'-- since that horrid affair, years ago, when you were so kind both to him and to me." "Don't couple yourself with him," he said sternly, "if, as I gather, you don't really care for him, Blanche." And then, almost inaudibly, he added: "You don't know the tortures of jealousy I've suffered at the thought of you and that man." "Tortures of jealousy ?" she repeated, astonished, and rather touched.
"Oh, Mark--poor Mark! Why didn't you ask me?
I've never, never cared for him in--in that sort of way.

How could you think I did ?" "Yet you're here, in his house," he said, "acting (so you said in your letter) as hostess to his guests?
And surely you've always been on terms of what most people would call close friendship with him ?" "Yes, I suppose I have"-- she hesitated--"in a way.