all. It certainly hadn't foreseen such a
case as this. "It's as plain as day that Mr. Burrage intends to marry
her--if he can," he said in a minute; that remark being better
calculated than any other he could think of to dissimulate his real
state of mind.

It drew no rejoinder from his companion, and after an instant he turned
his head a little and glanced at her. The result of something that
silently passed between them was to make her say, abruptly: "Mr. Ransom,
my sister never sent you an invitation to this place. Didn't it come
from Verena Tarrant?"

"I haven't the least idea."

"As you hadn't the least acquaintance with Mrs. Burrage, who else could
it have come from?"

"If it came from Miss Tarrant, I ought at least to recognise her
courtesy by listening to her."

"If you rise from this sofa I will tell Olive what I suspect. She will
be perfectly capable of carrying Verena off to China--or anywhere out of
your reach."

"And pray what is it you suspect?"

"That you two have been in correspondence."

"Tell her whatever you like, Mrs. Luna," said the young man, with the
grimness of resignation.

"You are quite unable to deny it, I see."

"I never contradict a lady."

"We shall see if I can't make you tell a fib. Haven't you been seeing
Miss Tarrant, too?"

"Where should I have seen her? I can't see all the way to Boston, as you
said the other day."

"Haven't you been there--on secret visits?"

Ransom started just perceptibly; but to conceal it, the next instant, he
stood up.

"They wouldn't be secret if I were to tell you."

Looking down at her he saw that her words were a happy hit, not the
result of definite knowledge. But she appeared to him vain, egotistical,
grasping, odious.

"Well, I shall give the alarm," she went on; "that is, I will if you
leave me. Is that the way a Southern gentleman treats a lady? Do as I
wish, and I will let you off!"

"You won't let me off from staying with you."

"Is it such a _corvee_? I never heard of such rudeness!" Mrs. Luna
cried. "All the same, I am determined to keep you if I can!"

Ransom felt that she must be in the wrong, and yet superficially she
seemed (and it was quite intolerable) to have right on her side. All
this while Verena's golden voice, with her words indistinct, solicited,
tantalised his ear. The question had evidently got on Mrs. Luna's
nerves; she had reached that point of feminine embroilment when a woman
is perverse for the sake