Furtively she watched him, trying to
discover if he felt it too. The look of age was on his face, and it was
clouded with discontent. Anxiously she sought some sign of sickness to
account for it. But, no. There was no trace of physical suffering; the
trouble was mental.
"You are not looking well," Lorrimer said at last. "I suppose you have
been starving yourself since I saw you. You have had no lunch to-day
again. You will kill yourself if you go on like that. I was speaking
about you to a doctor the other day. He said you could not fast as you
do without taking _something_--stimulants or sedatives." Ideala
winced. "What an insulting thing to say," she exclaimed, indignantly.
"I will not allow you to adopt that tone with me. You have no right to
scold me."
"I have, and shall," he retorted. "I suppose you want to kill yourself.
Perhaps it is the best thing people can do who hate their lives."
"I don't hate my life; I don't want to die," she rejoined.
"The other day you said you loathed your life."
"You are accusing me of inconsistency," she said. "You! who are in two
states of mind every time I see you!" She got up.
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