e with care,
as if he were choosing his words. "Miss Leighton was with her; and we
all had tea together."

"At Upton House?"

"Yes."

Jimmy's eyes were gleaming.

"How does the old place look?" he asked eagerly. "Gad! don't I wish
I'd got enough money to buy it myself. You've no idea what a ripping
fine time we used to have there years ago."

"I'm sure you did; but--well, as a matter of fact, I believe the house
is sold."

"Sold!"

"Yes; a man named Kettering--a friend of your brother's, I believe--is
negotiating for it, at any rate. Whether the purchase is really
completed or not, I----"

"Kettering!" Jimmy's voice sounded angry. "Kettering--that stuck-up
ass!" he said savagely.

Sangster laughed.

"I shouldn't have described him as stuck-up at all," he said calmly.
"He struck me as being an extremely nice sort of fellow."

"Was he there, then?"

"Yes--he's staying somewhere in the neighbourhood temporarily, I
believe, from what I heard; at any rate, he seemed very friendly
with--with your wife and Miss Leighton."

Jimmy began pacing the room.

"I remember him well," he said darkly, after a moment. "Big chap with
a brown moustache--pots of money." He walked the length of the room
again. "Christine ought not to encourage him," he burst out presently.
"What on earth must people think, as I'm not there."

"I don't see any harm," Sangster began mildly.

Jimmy rounded on him:

"You--you wouldn't see harm in anything; but Christine's a very
attractive little thing, and----" He broke off, flushing dully.
"Anyway, I won't have it," he added snappily.

"I don't see how you're going to stop it, unless----"

"Unless what?"

"Unless you go down there." Sangster spoke deliberately now. In spite
of his calm assertion that there was no harm in Kettering's visit to
Upton House, his anxious eyes had noticed the indefinable something in
Kettering's manner towards Christine that had struck Gladys Leighton
that first evening. Sangster knew men well, and he knew, without any
plainer signs or telling, that it was not the house itself that took
Kettering there so often, but the little mistress of the house, with
her sweet eyes and her pathetic little smile.

He got up and laid a hand on Jimmy's shoulder as he spoke.

"Why not go down yourself?" he said casually.

Jimmy swore.

"I said I wouldn't. . . . I'm not going to be the first to give in.
It was her doing--she sent me away. If she wants