You know perfectly well the state he's in, and you know how he got
into it."

"Yes. And I know," she said, "what you think of me."

"It's more than I do," said Straker.

She smiled subtly, mysteriously, tolerantly, as it were.

"What did you do it for, Philippa?"

Her smile grew more subtle, more tolerant, more mysterious; it
measured him and found him wanting.

"If I told you," she said, "I don't think you'd understand. But I'll
try and make you."

She turned with him and they walked slowly toward the house.

"You saw," she said, "where he was going before I came? I got him
out of that, didn't I?"

He was silent, absorbed in contemplating the amazing fabric of her
thought.

"Does it very much matter how I did it?"

"Yes," said Straker, "if you ask me, I should say it did. The last
state of him, to my mind, was decidedly worse than the first."

"What do you suppose I did to him?"

"If you want the frankness of a brother, there's no doubt you--led
him on."

"I led him on--to heights he'd never have contemplated without me."

Straker tried to eliminate all expression from his face.

"What do you suppose I did to him last night?"

"I can only suppose you led him further, since he went further."

By this time Straker's tact and delicacy were all gone.

"Yes," said Miss Tarrant, "he went pretty far. But, on the whole,
it's just as well he did, seeing what's come of it."

"What _has_ come of it?"

"Well, I think he realizes that he has a soul. That's something."

"I didn't know it was his soul you were concerned with."

"He didn't, either. Did he tell you what I said to him?"

"He told me you gave him a dressing down. But there was something
that he wouldn't tell. What _did_ you say to him?"

"I said I supposed, after all, he had a soul, and I asked him what
he meant to do about it."

"What does he?"

"That's what I want him back for," she said, "to see. Whatever he
does with it, practically I've saved it."

She turned to him, lucid and triumphant.

"Could any other woman have done it? Do you see Mary Probyn doing
it?"

"Not that way."

"It was the only way. You must," she said, "have temperament."

The word took Straker's breath away.

"You didn't like the way I did it. I can't help that. I had to use
the means at my disposal. If I hadn't led him on how could I have
got hold of him? If I hadn't led him further how could I have got
him on an inch?"

"So that," said Straker quietly