s. Willoughby was, as ever, staunch in her defence, though a
recollection of Clarice's tearful visit with Conway's arrival for a
climax prompted her now and again to laugh in the midst of it.

'You mistake thoughtlessness for tricks,' she said. 'Clarice is only a
child as yet.'

'She has a child's capacity for emotion, I admit,' corrected Fielding,
'but a woman's knowledge of its use. The combination is deplorable.'

Fielding inquired about Drake, and was told that he had not been
seen lately. 'It looks as if he was declining in favour,' Mrs.
Willoughby added.

'Not necessarily. The man's busy--there's a company coming out.'

'A solid one?'

'Likely to be, since Drake handles it. I am thinking of taking shares.'

Mrs. Willoughby was surprised. Fielding seemed to her the last man
calculated by nature for dabbling in stocks.

'You!' she exclaimed. Fielding nodded assent.

'Then don't do it,' Mrs. Willoughby flashed out vigorously. 'Don't think
of it. Oh, I know those men in the City! Their friends get ruined, and
they--well, I mustn't say anything against them, because my husband was
one of them, poor dear,--but they move into larger offices. Mr. Drake has
been asking you to join him?'

'He hasn't done anything of the sort. I heard of the matter through quite
an independent channel. However, I am not ruined yet, and the company
won't be floated for another four months. And, after all, it's my money.'

Mrs. Willoughby became quiet.

'Well,' she said, and she derived some satisfaction from the thought, 'at
all events Clarice has dropped talking about him.'

Fielding laughed.

'That means that it's Mallinson's turn on the roundabout and
nothing more.'

'Sidney Mallinson has been refused.'

'Refused! When?'

'On the Sunday we lunched at Beaufort Gardens.'

'Oh!'

Fielding was silent for a moment. He was thinking that he had met
Mallinson of late with unusual frequency here at Mrs. Willoughby's house.

'But are you sure?' he asked.

'Certain; he told me so himself. Clarice told me too the day after.' Mrs.
Willoughby began again to laugh. 'She would have prevented him if she
could, but apparently he tried to take her by storm.'

'Oh!' exclaimed Fielding. 'On the Sunday afternoons you say? Then I was
to blame, I am afraid, for I gave him precisely that advice on the Sunday
morning. Of course, I never thought that he would take it.'

Fielding met Sidney Mallinson again and again at the house in
Knigh