Louise leaned a little forward in her chair.
“And you,” she remarked, “are an editor! Do you feel quite safe, Amy? Mr. Wrayson may rob us of our most cherished secrets.”
Her eyes challenged his, her lips were parted in a slight smile. Underneath the levity of her remark, he was fully conscious of the undernote of serious meaning.
“I am not afraid of Mr. Wrayson,” the Baroness answered, smiling. “My age and my dressmaker are the only two things I keep entirely to myself, and I don’t think he is likely to guess either.”
“And you?” he asked, looking into her companion’s eyes.
“There are many things,” she answered, in a low tone, “which one keeps to oneself, because confidences with regard to them are impossible. And yet—”
She paused. Her eyes seemed to be following out the mystic design painted upon her fan.
“And yet?” he reminded her under his breath.
“Yet,” she continued, glancing towards the Baroness, and lowering her voice as though anxious not to be overheard, “there is something poisonous, I think, about secrets. To have them known without disclosing them would be very often—a great relief.”
He leaned a little towards her.
“Is that a challenge?” he asked, “if I can find out?”
The colour left her face with amazing suddenness. She drew away from him quickly. Her whisper was almost a moan.
“No! for God’s sake, no!” she murmured. “I meant nothing. You must not think that I was speaking about myself.”
“I hoped that you were,” he answered simply.
The Baroness turned in her chair as though anxious to join in the conversation. At that moment came a knock at the door of the box. Wrayson rose and opened it. Heneage stood there and entered at once, as though his coming were the most natural thing in the world.
“Thought I recognized you,” he remarked, shaking hands with Wrayson. “I believe, too, I may be mistaken, but I fancy that I have had the pleasure of meeting the Baroness de Sturm.”
The Baroness turned towards him with a smile. Nevertheless, Wrayson noticed what seemed to him a strange thing. The slim- fingered, bejewelled hand which rested upon the ledge of the box was trembling. The Baroness was disturbed.
“At Brussels, I believe,” she remarked, inclining her head graciously.
“At Brussels, certainly,” he answered, bowing low.
She turned to Louise.
“Louise,” she said, “you must let me present Mr. Heneage—Miss Deveney. Mr. Heneage has a cousin, I believe, of the same name, in the Belgian Legation. I remember seeing you dance with him at the Palace.”
The two exchanged greetings. Heneage accepted a chair and spoke of the performance. The conversation became general and of stereotyped form. Yet Wrayson was uneasily conscious of something underneath it all which he could not fathom. The atmosphere of the box was charged with some electrical disturbance. Heneage alone seemed thoroughly at his ease. He kept his seat until the close of the performance, and even then seemed in no hurry to depart. Wrayson, however, took his cue from the Baroness, who was obviously anxious for him to go.
“Goodnight, Heneage!” he said. “I may see you at the club later.”
Heneage smiled a little oddly as he turned away.
“Perhaps,” he said.
It was not until they were on their way out that Wrayson realized that she was slipping away from him once more. Then he took his courage into his hands and spoke boldly.
“I wonder,” he said, “if I might be allowed to see you ladies home. I have something to say to Miss Fitzmaurice,” he added simply, turning to the Baroness.
“By all means,” she answered graciously, “if you don’t mind rather an uncomfortable seat. We are staying in Battersea. It seems a long way out, but it is quiet, and Louise and I like it.”
“In Battersea?” Wrayson repeated vaguely.
The Baroness looked over her shoulder. They were standing on the pavement, waiting for their electric brougham.
“Yes!” she answered, dropping her voice a little, “in Frederic Mansions. By the bye, we are neighbours, I believe, are we not?”
“Quite close ones,” Wrayson answered. “I live in the next block of flats.”
The Baroness looked again over her shoulder.
“Your friend, Mr. Heneage, is close behind,” she whispered, “and we are living so quietly, Louise and I, that we do not care for callers. Tell the man ‘home’ simply.”
Wrayson obeyed, and the carriage glided off. Heneage had been within a few feet of them when they had started, and although his attention appeared to be elsewhere, the Baroness’ caution was obviously justified. She leaned back amongst the cushions with a little sigh of relief.
“Mr. Wrayson,” she inquired, “may I ask if Mr. Heneage is a particular friend of yours?”
Wrayson shook his head.
“I do not think that any man could call himself Heneage’s particular friend,” he answered. “He is exceedingly reticent about himself and his doings. He is a man whom none of us know much of.”
The Baroness leaned a little forward.
“Mr. Heneage,” she said slowly, “is associated in my mind with days and events which, just at present, both Louise and I are only anxious to forget. He may be everything that he should be. Perhaps I am prejudiced. But if I were you, I would have as little to do as possible with that man.”
“We do not often meet,” Wrayson answered, “and ours is only a club acquaintanceship. It is never likely to be more.”
“So much the better,” the Baroness declared. “Don’t you agree with me, Louise?”
“I do not like Mr. Heneage,” the girl answered. “But then, I have never spoken a dozen words to him in my life.”
“You have known him intimately?” Wrayson asked the Baroness.
She shrugged her shoulders and looked out of the window.
“Never that, quite,” she answered. “I know enough of him, however, to be quite sure that the advice which I have given you is good.”
The carriage drew up in the Albert Road, within a hundred yards or so of Wrayson’s own block of flats. The Baroness alighted first.
“You must come in and have a whisky and soda,” she said to Wrayson.
“If I may,” he answered, looking at Louise.
The Baroness passed on. Louise, with a slight shrug of the shoulders, followed her.
X. OUTCAST
The room into which a waiting man servant showed them was large and handsomely furnished. Whisky and soda, wine and sandwiches were upon the sideboard. The Baroness, stopping only to light a cigarette, moved towards the door.
“I shall return,” she said, “in a quarter of an hour.”
She looked for a moment steadily at her friend, and then turned away. Louise strolled to the sideboard and helped herself to a sandwich.
“Come