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Rh how Diana felt it—which was beating its wings against the brass rod of the portières. But it was fluttering rather helplessly, blindly, as if it had lost some of its energy and vigor; and again Diana felt sorry and correspondingly her hatred grew. And her determination.

"I'll get you—you—"

She waited until her breath came more evenly, rose, walked noiselessly to the portières and rustled them.

The Thing was startled. Diana could feel the tiny wings flutter and beat. She could hear its terrible, straining effort to bloat into a huge soap-bubble and, not succeeding, to shrink into a pinpoint.

But something was making it impossible, and Diana knew what it was.

It was the fact that, in one of the hidden back cells of her brain, the thought of Bunny Whipple's silly little fool of a golden-haired wife had taken firm root, refused to budge.

So Diana kept the thought. She nursed it. It seemed like a bait, and she thrust it forward.

She spoke out loud, her face raised up to the portières: