Her brother-in-law seemed to feel for the moment the p.r.i.c.k of this observation. 'What has such a piece of nasty boldness as that to do with respect? She's the first that ever defied me!' exclaimed the young man, whose aspect somehow scarcely confirmed this pretension. 'You know all about her--don't make believe you don't,' he continued in another tone.

'You see everything--you're one of the sharp ones. There's no use beating about the bush, Laura--you've lived in this precious house and you're not so green as that comes to. Besides, you're so good yourself that you needn't give a shriek if one is obliged to say what one means.

Why didn't you grow up a little sooner? Then, over there in New York, it would certainly have been you I would have made up to. _You_ would have respected me--eh? now don't say you wouldn't.' He rambled on, turning about the room again, partly like a person whose sequences were naturally slow but also a little as if, though he knew what he had in mind, there were still a scruple attached to it that he was trying to rub off.

'I take it that isn't what I must sit up to listen to, Lionel, is it?'

Laura said, wearily.

'Why, you don't want to go to bed at nine o'clock, do you? That's all rot, of course. But I want you to help me.'

'To help you--how?'

'I'll tell you--but you must give me my head. I don't know what I said to you before dinner--I had had too many brandy and sodas. Perhaps I was too free; if I was I beg your pardon. I made the governess bolt--very proper in the superintendent of one's children. Do you suppose they saw anything? I shouldn't care for that. I did take half a dozen or so; I was thirsty and I was awfully gratified.'

'You have little enough to gratify you.'

'Now that's just where you are wrong. I don't know when I've fancied anything so much as what I told you.'

'What you told me?'

'About her being in Paris. I hope she'll stay a month!'

'I don't understand you,' Laura said.

'Are you very sure, Laura? My dear, it suits my book! Now you know yourself he's not the first.'

Laura was silent; his round eyes were fixed on her face and she saw something she had not seen before--a little shining point which on Lionel's part might represent an idea, but which made his expression conscious as well as eager. 'He?' she presently asked. 'Whom are you speaking of?'

'Why, of Charley Crispin, G----' And Lionel Berrington accompanied this name with a startling imprecation.

'What has he to do----?'

'He has everything to do. Isn't he with her there?'

'How should I know? You said Lady Ringrose.'

'Lady Ringrose is a mere blind--and a devilish poor one at that. I'm sorry to have to say it to you, but he's her lover. I mean Selina's. And he ain't the first.'

There was another short silence while they stood opposed, and then Laura asked--and the question was unexpected--'Why do you call him Charley?'

'Doesn't he call me Lion, like all the rest?' said her brother-in-law, staring.

'You're the most extraordinary people. I suppose you have a certain amount of proof before you say such things to me?'

'Proof, I've oceans of proof! And not only about Crispin, but about Deepmere.'

'And pray who is Deepmere?'

'Did you never hear of Lord Deepmere? He has gone to India. That was before you came. I don't say all this for my pleasure, Laura,' Mr.

Berrington added.

'Don't you, indeed?' asked the girl with a singular laugh. 'I thought you were so glad.'

'I'm glad to know it but I'm not glad to tell it. When I say I'm glad to know it I mean I'm glad to be fixed at last. Oh, I've got the tip! It's all open country now and I know just how to go. I've gone into it most extensively; there's nothing you can't find out to-day--if you go to the right place. I've--I've----' He hesitated a moment, then went on: 'Well, it's no matter what I've done. I know where I am and it's a great comfort. She's up a tree, if ever a woman was. Now we'll see who's a beetle and who's a toad!' Lionel Berrington concluded, gaily, with some incongruity of metaphor.

'It's not true--it's not true--it's not true,' Laura said, slowly.

'That's just what she'll say--though that's not the way she'll say it.

Oh, if she could get off by your saying it for her!--for you, my dear, would be believed.'

'Get off--what do you mean?' the girl demanded, with a coldness she failed to feel, for she was tingling all over with shame and rage.

'Why, what do you suppose I'm talking about? I'm going to haul her up and to have it out.'

'You're going to make a scandal?'

'_Make_ it? Bless my soul, it isn't me! And I should think it was made enough. I'm going to appeal to the laws of my country--that's what I'm going to do. She pretends I'm stopped, whatever she does. But that's all gammon--I ain't!'

'I understand--but you won't do anything so horrible,' said Laura, very gently.

'Horrible as you please, but less so than going on in this way; I haven't told you the fiftieth part--you will easily understand that I can't. They are not nice things to say to a girl like you--especially about Deepmere, if you didn't know it. But when they happen you've got to look at them, haven't you? That's the way I look at it.'

'It's not true--it's not true--it's not true,' Laura Wing repeated, in the same way, slowly shaking her head.

'Of course you stand up for your sister--but that's just what I wanted to say to you, that you ought to have some pity for _me_ and some sense of justice. Haven't I always been nice to you? Have you ever had so much as a nasty word from me?'

This appeal touched the girl; she had eaten her brother-in-law's bread for months, she had had the use of all the luxuries with which he was surrounded, and to herself personally she had never known him anything but good-natured. She made no direct response however; she only said--'Be quiet, be quiet and leave her to me. I will answer for her.'

'Answer for her--what do you mean?'

'She shall be better--she shall be reasonable--there shall be no more talk of these horrors. Leave her to me--let me go away with her somewhere.'

'Go away with her? I wouldn't let you come within a mile of her, if you were _my_ sister!'

'Oh, shame, shame!' cried Laura Wing, turning away from him.

She hurried to the door of the room, but he stopped her before she reached it. He got his back to it, he barred her way and she had to stand there and hear him. 'I haven't said what I wanted--for I told you that I wanted you to help me. I ain't cruel--I ain't insulting--you can't make out that against me; I'm sure you know in your heart that I've swallowed what would sicken most men. Therefore I will say that you ought to be fair. You're too clever not to be; _you_ can't pretend to swallow----' He paused a moment and went on, and she saw it was his idea--an idea very simple and bold. He wanted her to side with him--to watch for him--to help him to get his divorce. He forbore to say that she owed him as much for the hospitality and protection she had in her poverty enjoyed, but she was sure that was in his heart. 'Of course she's your sister, but when one's sister's a perfect bad 'un there's no law to force one to jump into the mud to save her. It _is_ mud, my dear, and mud up to your neck. You had much better think of her children--you had much better stop in _my_ boat.'

'Do you ask me to help you with evidence against her?' the girl murmured. She had stood there pa.s.sive, waiting while he talked, covering her face with her hands, which she parted a little, looking at him.

He hesitated a moment. 'I ask you not to deny what you have seen--what you feel to be true.'

'Then of the abominations of which you say you have proof, you haven't proof.'

'Why haven't I proof?'

'If you want _me_ to come forward!'

'I shall go into court with a strong case. You may do what you like. But I give you notice and I expect you not to forget that I have given it.

Don't forget--because you'll be asked--that I have told you to-night where she is and with whom she is and what measures I intend to take.'