But Olga lingered to whisper vehemently in Nick's ear.

He laughed and shook his head. "Go, child, go! You don't know anything about it. And Muriel is waiting. You should never keep a guest waiting."

Olga went reluctantly. They pa.s.sed out into the clear June sunshine together and down towards the shady shrubberies beyond the lawns.

"Can Nick play tennis?" Muriel asked, as they crossed a marked-out court.

"Yes, he can do anything," the child said proudly. "He was on horseback this morning, and he managed splendidly. We generally play tennis in the evening. He almost always wins. His services are terrific. I can't think how he does it. He calls it juggling. I try to manage with only one hand sometimes--just to keep him company--but I always make a mess of things. There's no one in the world as clever as Nick."

Muriel felt inclined to agree with her, though in her opinion this distinguishing quality was not an altogether admirable one. She infinitely preferred people with fewer brains. She would not, however, say this to Olga, and they paced on together under the trees in silence. Suddenly a warm hand slid within her arm, and Olga's grey eyes, very loving and wistful, looked up into hers.

"Muriel darling," she whispered softly, "don't you--don't you--like Nick after all?"

The colour rushed over Muriel's face in a vivid flood.

"Like him! Like him!" she stammered. "Why do you ask?"

"Because, dear--don't be vexed, I love you frightfully--you did hurt him so at lunch," explained Olga, pressing very close to her.

"Hurt him! Hurt him!" Again Muriel repeated her words, then, recovering sharply, broke into a sudden laugh. "My dear child, I couldn't possibly do such a thing if I tried."

"But you did, you did!" persisted Olga, a faint note of indignation in her voice. "You don't know Nick. He feels--tremendously. Of course you might not see it, for it doesn't often show. But I know--I always know--when he is hurt, by the way he laughs. And he was hurt to-day."

She stuck firmly to her point, notwithstanding Muriel's equally persistent att.i.tude of incredulity, till even Muriel was conscious at last in her inner soul of a faint wonder, a dim and wholly negligible sense of regret. Not that she would under any circ.u.mstances have recalled that thrust of hers. She felt it had been dealt in fair fight; but even in fair fight there come sometimes moments of regret, when one feels that the enemy's hand has been intentionally slack. She knew well that, had he chosen, Nick might have thrust back, instantly and disconcertingly, as his manner was. But he had refrained, merely covering up his wound--if wound there had been--with the laugh that had so wrung Olga's loving heart. His ways were strange. She would never understand him. But she would like to have known how deep that thrust had gone.

Could she have overheard the conversation between Nick and his remaining guest that followed her departure, she might have received enlightenment on this point, but Nick took very good care to ensure that that conversation should be overheard by none.

As soon as Grange had finished his coffee, he proposed a move to the library, and led the way thither, leaving his own drink untouched behind him.

The library was a large and comfortable apartment completely shut away from the rest of the house, and singularly ill-adapted for eavesdroppers. The windows looked upon a wide stretch of lawn upon which even a bird could scarcely have lingered unnoticed. The light that filtered in through green sun-blinds was cool and restful. An untidy writing-table and a sofa strewn with cushions in disorderly att.i.tudes testified to the fact that Nick had appropriated this room for his own particular den. There was also a sun-bonnet tossed upon a chair which seemed to indicate that Olga at least did not regard his privacy as inviolable. The ancient brown volumes stacked upon shelves that ranged almost from floor to ceiling were comfortably undisturbed.

It was plainly a sanctum in which ease and not learning ruled supreme.

Nick established his visitor in an easy-chair and hunted for an ash-tray. Grange watched him uncomfortably.

"I'm awfully sorry about your arm, Ratcliffe," he said at length. "A filthy bit of bad luck that."

"d.a.m.nable," said Nick.

"I've been meaning to look you up for a long time," Grange proceeded, "but somehow it hasn't come off."

Nick laughed rather dryly. He was perfectly well aware that Grange had been steadily avoiding him ever since his return. "Very good of you,"

he said, subsiding upon the sofa and pulling the cushions about him.

"I've been saving up my congratulations for you all these weeks. I might have written, of course, but I had a notion that the spoken word would be more forcible."

Grange stirred uneasily, neither understanding nor greatly relishing Nick's tone. He wished vehemently that he would leave the subject alone.

Nick, however, had no such intention. A faint fiendish smile was twitching the corners of his lips. He did not even glance in Blake's direction. There was no need.

"Well, I wish you joy," he said lightly.

"Thank you," returned Grange, without elation and with very little grat.i.tude. In some occult fashion, Nick was making it horribly awkward for him. He longed to change the subject, but could find nothing to say--possibly because Nick quite obviously had not yet done with it.

"Going to get married before you sail?" he asked abruptly.

"I don't think so." Very reluctantly Grange made reply.

"Why not?" said Nick.

"Muriel doesn't want to be married till she is out of mourning,"

Grange explained.

"Why doesn't she go out of mourning then?"

Grange didn't know, hadn't even thought of it.

"Perhaps she will elect to wear mourning all her life," suggested Nick. "Have you thought of that?"

There was a distinct gibe in this, and Grange at once retreated to a less exposed position. "I am quite willing to wait for her," he said.

"And she knows it."

"You're deuced easily pleased then," rejoined Nick. "And let me tell you--for I'm sure you don't know--there's not a single woman under the sun who appreciates that sort of patience."

Grange ignored the information with a decidedly sullen air. He did not regard Nick as particularly well qualified to give him advice upon such a subject.

After a moment Nick saw his att.i.tude, and laughed aloud. "Yes, say it, man! It's quite true in a sense, and I shouldn't contradict you if it weren't. But has it never occurred to you that I was under a terrific disadvantage from the very beginning? Do you remember that I undertook the job that you shirked? Or do you possibly present the matter to yourself--and others--in some more attractive form?"

He turned upon his elbow with the question and regarded Grange with an odd expectancy. But Grange smoked in silence, not raising his eyes.

Suddenly Nick spoke in a different tone, a tone that was tense without vibrating. "It doesn't matter how you put it. The truth remains.

You didn't love her then. If you had loved her, you must have been ready--as I was ready--to make the final sacrifice. But you were not ready. You hung back. You let me take the place which only a man who cared enough to protect her to the uttermost could have taken. You let me do this thing, and I did it. I brought her through untouched. I kept her--night and day I kept her--from harm of any sort. And she has been my first care ever since. You won't believe this, I daresay, but it's true. And--mark this well--I will only let her go to the man who will make her happy. Once I meant to be that man. You don't suppose, do you, that I brought her safe through h.e.l.l just for the pleasure of seeing her marry another fellow? But it's all the same now what I did it for. I've been knocked out of the running." His eyelids suddenly quivered as if at a blow. "It doesn't matter to you how. It wasn't because she fancied any one else. She hadn't begun to think of you in those days. I let her go, never mind why. I let her go, but she is still in my keeping, and will be till she is the actual property of another man--yes, and after that too. I saved her, remember. I won the right of guardianship over her. So be careful what you do. Marry her if you love her. But if you don't, leave her alone. She shall be no man's second best. That I swear."

He ceased abruptly. His yellow face was full of pa.s.sion. His hand was clenched upon the sofa-cushion. The whole body of the man seemed to thrill and quiver with electric force.

And then in a moment it all pa.s.sed. As at the touching of a spring his muscles relaxed. The naked pa.s.sion was veiled again--the old mask of banter replaced.

He stretched out his hand to the man who had sat in silence and listened to that one fierce outburst of a force which till then had contained itself.

"I speak as a fool," he said lightly. "Nothing new for me, you'll say.

But just for my satisfaction--because she hates me so--put your hand in mine and swear you will seek her happiness before everything else in the world. I shall never trouble you again after this fashion. I have spoken."

Blake sat for several seconds without speaking. Then, as if impelled thereto, he leaned slowly forward and laid his hand in Nick's. He seemed to have something to say, but it did not come.

Nick waited.

"I swear," Blake said at length.

His voice was low, and he did not attempt to look Nick in the face, but he obviously meant what he said.

And Nick seemed to be satisfied. In less than five seconds, he had tossed the matter carelessly aside as one having no further concern in it. But the memory of that interview was as a searing flame to Blake's soul for long after.