“Oh, la-la!” Henrietta cried.  “Don’t be so childish!”—­Though she did in point of fact know the said way perfectly well and admired it.  Once upon a time hadn’t Sir Charles, indeed, rather superbly practised it in her—­Henrietta’s—­defence?

She sighed; while her temper took a nasty turn towards her yellow-faced, apologetic little General, waiting patiently for sight of the English newspapers, under the veil of mosquito netting in his little bed.  Even in his roaring forties—­had his forties ever roared though?—­she doubted it—­not to save his life could he ever have looked down his nose at an offending fellow-man like that.—­Ah!  Charles Verity—­Charles Verity!—­Her heart misgave her that she had been too precipitate in this third marriage.  If she had waited?—­

“Of course, with my wretchedly short sight, I may have been mistaken,” Wace continued, pointedly ignoring her interruption, “but I am almost convinced I recognized Colonel Carteret and Miss Verity—­Damaris—­through the open door, on the other side of the salle d’attente, in the crowd on the platform about to take their places in the train from Cannes, which had just come in.”

Henrietta ceased to scan the head-lines or deplore her matrimonial precipitation.

“Carteret and Damaris alone and together?” she exclaimed with raised eyebrows.

“Yes, and it occurred to me that I there touched upon the explanation, in part at least, of Sir Charles Verity’s offensive manner.  He had been to see them off and was, for some reason, unwilling that we—­you and I, cousin Henrietta—­should know of their journey.”

Even in private life, at the very head-waters and source of her intrigues and her scheming, Henrietta cleverly maintained an effect of secrecy.  She showed herself an adept in the fine art of outflanking incautious intruders.  Never did she wholly reveal herself or her purposes; but reserved for her own use convenient run-holes, down which she could escape from even the most intimate of her co-adjutors and employees.  If masterly in advance, she showed even more masterly in retreat; and that too often at the expense of her fellow intriguers.  Without scruple she deserted them, when personal safety or personal reputation suggested the wisdom of so doing.  Though herself perplexed and suspicious, she now rounded on Wace, taking a high tone with him.

“But why, my dear Marshall, why?” she enquired, “should Sir Charles object to our—­as you put it—­knowing?  That seems to me an entirely gratuitous assumption on your part.  In all probability Mary Ellice and the boys were on the platform too, only you didn’t happen to catch sight of them.  And, in any case, our friends at the Grand Hotel are not accountable to us for their comings and goings.  They are free agents, and it does really strike me as just a little gossipy to keep such a very sharp eye upon their movements.—­Don’t be furious with me”—­