This was the first time that Claire had seen Stillman since the musicale.  She had thought a great deal about him and particularly about his problem.  She felt a great desire to know everything—­all the details of the unfortunate circumstance that had driven his wife into a madhouse, and yet whenever her mother broached the subject Claire changed the topic with curious panic.  She seemed to dread the hard, almost triumphant manner that her mother assumed in tracking misfortune to its lair and gloating over it.  She began to wonder whether Stillman would be swinging back to the city on a late boat ... or would the storm keep him at Edington’s sister’s home all night?

She was in the midst of this speculation when Flint came into the room.

“We’ll eat early and have that off our minds,” he announced.  His manner was brusk and business-like again.  Claire felt reassured.

But she was disturbed to find a cocktail at her place at the table.

“Well, here’s glad to see you!” Flint raised his glass and tilted it ever so slightly in her direction.  Claire lifted the cocktail to her lips and set it down untasted.  “What’s the matter?  Getting unsociable again?”

“No, Mr. Flint.  I don’t care for cocktails.”

“Oh, all right!  We’ll send down-cellar and get some wine.”

“Thank you, not for me.”

“I suppose you don’t care for wine, either?” His voice had a bantering quality, with a shade of menace in it.  “Or maybe the right party isn’t here.  I’ve noticed that makes a difference.  Females are damned moral with the wrong fellow.”

His attack was so direct and insolent that Claire missed the trepidation that might have come with a more covert move.  She was no longer uncertain.  There was a sharp relief in realizing that all the cards were on the table.  She felt also that there was no immediate danger.  Flint was far from sober, but he was in his own home.  She had the conviction that he was merely skirmishing, testing the strength or weakness of the line he hoped to penetrate.  Her reply was rather more of a challenge than she could have imagined herself giving under such a circumstance.

“And if I were to tell you that I don’t care for wine, Mr. Flint?”

He threw open his napkin with a flourish.  “You’d be telling me a damned lie!  You drink wine at the Palace with Stillman and Edington.”

She had felt that he was going to say some such thing and for a moment it amused her.  It was so ridiculous to find this rather wan and wistful indiscretion assuming damaging proportions.  But a nasty fear succeeded her faint amusement.  Could it be possible that Stillman had gossiped?

“Who told you?” she demanded.