to hear it; by which he meant that he
was sorry for Mrs. Viveash.

She began to talk to him of trifles, small occurrences at Amberley,
of the affair of Mr. Higginson and Miss Probyn, and then, as by a
natural transition, of Miss Tarrant.

"Do you like Miss Tarrant?" she asked suddenly, point-blank.

Straker jibbed. "Well, really--I--I haven't thought about it."

He hadn't. He knew how he stood with her, how he felt about her; but
whether it amounted to liking or not liking he had not yet inquired.
But that instant he perceived that he did not like her, and he lied.

"Of course I like her. Why shouldn't I?"

"Because"--she was very slow about it--"somehow I should have said
that you were not that sort."

Her light on him came halting, obscured, shivering with all the
vibrations of her voice; but he could see through it, down to the
sources of her thinking, to something secret, luminous, and
profound--her light on Philippa.

She was instantly aware of what she had let him see.

"Oh," she cried, "that was horrid of me. It was feline."

"It was a little," he admitted.

"It's because I know she doesn't like me."

"Why not say at once it's because you don't like her?"

Her eyes, full, lucid, charged with meaning, flashed to him. She
leaped at the chance he offered her to be sincere.

"I don't," she said. "How can I?"

She talked again of trifles, to destroy all cohesion between that
utterance and her next.

"I say, I want you to do something for me. I want you to look after
Furny."

"To look after him?"

"To stand by him, if--if he has a bad time."

He promised her. And then Miss Tarrant claimed him. She was in her
mood of yesterday; but the charm no longer worked on him; he did not
find her adorable that morning.

After a longish round they were overtaken by Brocklebank in his
motor-car. He and Furnival were returning from the station after
seeing Mrs. Viveash off (Furny had had the decency to see her off).
Brocklebank gave a joyous shout and pulled up two yards in front of
them.

As they stood beside the car Straker noticed that Furnival's face
had a queer, mottled look, and that the muscles of his jaw were set
in an immobility of which he could hardly have believed him
capable. He was actually trying to look as if he didn't see Miss
Tarrant. And Miss Tarrant was looking straight at him.

Brocklebank wanted to know if Miss Tarrant cared for a run across
the Hog's Back before luncheon.

Miss