For a time this drew her back to him.  She was his constant and dutiful companion everywhere, leading him hither and thither, and attending to his wants; but very soon the tie bored her, and the attractions of society once again proved too great.  Hence for the past nine years—­Gabrielle being at school, first at Eastbourne and afterwards at Amiens—­she had amused herself and left her husband to his dry-as-dust hobbies and the loneliness of his black and sunless world.

The man who had just put that curious question to her was perhaps her closest friend.  To her he owed everything, though the world was in ignorance of the fact.  That they were friends everybody knew.  Indeed, they had been friends years ago in Bedford, before her marriage, for James was the only son of the Reverend Henry Flockart, vicar of one of the parishes in the town.  People living in Bedford recollected that the parson’s son had turned out rather badly, and had gone to America.  But a year or two after that the quiet-mannered old clergyman had died, the living had been given to a successor, and Bedford knew the name of Flockart no more.  After Winifred’s marriage, however, London society—­or rather a gay section of it—­became acquainted with James Flockart, who lived at ease in his pretty bachelor-rooms in Half-Moon Street, and who soon gathered about him a large circle of male acquaintances.  Sir Henry knew him, and raised no objection to his wife’s friendship towards him.  They had been boy and girl together; therefore what more natural than that they should be friends in later life?

In her schooldays Gabrielle knew practically nothing of this man; but now she had returned to be her father’s companion she had met him, and had bitter cause to hate both him and Lady Heyburn.  It was her own secret.  She kept it to herself.  She hid the truth from her father—­from every one.  She watched closely and in patience.  One day she would speak and tell the truth.  Until then, she resolved to keep to herself all that she knew.

“Well?” asked the man with the soft-pleated shirt-front and white waistcoat smeared with cigarette-ash.  “What have you decided?” he asked again.

“I’ve decided nothing,” was her blank answer.

“But you must.  Don’t be a silly fool,” he urged.  “You’ve surely had time to think over it?”

“No, I haven’t.”

“The girl knows nothing.  So what have you to fear?” he endeavoured to assure her.

Lady Heyburn shrugged her shoulders.  “How can you prove that she knows nothing?”

“Oh, she has eyes for nobody but the old man,” he laughed.  “To-night is an example.  Why, she wouldn’t come to Connachan, even though she knew that Walter was there.  She preferred to spend the evening here with her father.”

“She’s a little fool, of course, Jimmy,” replied the woman in pink; “but perhaps it was as well that she didn’t come.  I hate to have to chaperon the chit.  It makes me look so horribly old.”