For
some time he had recognized that his wound was healing under the spell
of creative work; he thought less often of the woman he loved, and with
less pain. He would not have the memory of those three days re-opened.

But the straight and narrow thoroughfare offered no refuge, and the
American saw him almost at once.

His unforced geniality made Trent ashamed, for he had liked the man.
They sat long over a meal, and Mr. Bunner talked. Trent listened to him,
now that he was in for it, with genuine pleasure, now and then
contributing a question or remark. Besides liking his companion, he
enjoyed his conversation for its own sake.

Mr. Bunner was, it appeared, resident in Paris as the chief Continental
agent of the Manderson firm, and fully satisfied with his position and
prospects. He discoursed on these for some twenty minutes. This subject
at length exhausted, he went on to tell Trent, who confessed that he had
been away from England for a year, that Marlowe had shortly after the
death of Manderson entered his father's business, which was now again in
a flourishing state, and had already come to be virtually in control of
it. They had kept up their intimacy, and were even now planning a
holiday for the summer. Mr. Bunner spoke with generous admiration of his
friend's talent for affairs. "Jack Marlowe has a natural big head," he
declared, "and if he had more experience, I wouldn't want to have him up
against me. He would put a crimp in me every time."

As the American's talk flowed on, Trent listened with growing surprise
and anxiety. It became more and more plain that something was very wrong
in his theory of the situation; there was no mention of its central
figure. Presently Mr. Bunner mentioned that Marlowe was engaged to be
married to an Irish girl, whose charms he celebrated with native
enthusiasm.

Trent clasped his hands savagely together beneath the table. What could
have happened? His ideas were sliding and shifting. At last he forced
himself to put a direct question.

Mr. Bunner was not very fully informed. He knew that Mrs. Manderson had
left England immediately after the settlement of her husband's affairs,
and had lived for some time in Italy. She had returned not long ago to
London, where she had decided not to live in the house in Mayfair, and
had bought a smaller one in the Hampstead neighborhood; also, he
understood, one somewhere in the country. She was said to go but little
into society. "And