Upon one, even but moderately, versed in the secular arts of twig-liming, such flashes would have acted as an effective warning and deterrent.  Not so upon Theresa.  She barely noticed them, as blindly heroic, she pounded along leading her piteous forlorn hope.  Her chance—­her unique chance, in nowise to be missed—­and, still more, those obscure hungers, fed by the excitement of this midnight tete-a-tete, rushed her forward upon the abyss; while at every sputtering sentence, whether of adulation, misplaced prudery, or thinly veiled animosity towards Damaris, she became more tedious, more frankly intolerable and ridiculous to him whose favour she so desperately sought.  Under less anxious circumstances Charles Verity might have been contemptuously amused at this exhibition of futile ardour.  Now it exasperated him.  Yet he waited, in rather cruel patience.  Presently he would demolish her, if to do so appeared worth the trouble.  Meanwhile she should have her say, since incidentally he might learn something from it bearing upon the cause of Damaris’ illness.

But now, when, at the climax of her narrative, Theresa—­seized by a spasm of retrospective resentment and jealousy, the picture of the young man carrying the girl tenderly in his arms across the dusky lawns arising before her—­choked and her voice cracked up into a bat-like squeaking, Charles Verity’s self-imposed forbearance ran dry.

“I must remind you that neither my time nor capacity of listening are inexhaustible, Miss Bilson,” he said to her.  “May I ask you to be so good as to come to the point.  By whom was Damaris rescued and brought home last night?”

“Ah! that is what I so deeply regret,” Theresa quavered, still obstinately dense and struggling with the after convulsion of her choke.  “I felt so shocked and annoyed on your account, Sir Charles, when the maids told me, knowing how you would disapprove such a—­such an incident in connection with Damaris.—­She was brought home, carried”—­she paused—­“carried indoors by the owner of that objectionable public-house on the island.  He holds some position in the Mercantile Marine, I believe.  I have seen him recently once or twice myself in the village—­his name is Faircloth.”

Theresa pursed up her lips as she finished speaking.  The glasses of her gold pince-nez seemed to gleam aggressively in the lamp-light.  The backs of the leather-bound volumes in the many book-cases gleamed also, but unaggressively, with the mellow sheen—­as might fancifully be figured—­of the ripe and tolerant wisdom their pages enshrined.  The pearl-grey porcelain company of Chinese monsters, saints and godlings, ranged above them placid, mysteriously smiling, gleamed as well.

For a time, silence, along with these various gleamings, sensibly, even a little uncannily, held possession of the room.  Then Charles Verity moved, stiffly, and for once awkwardly, all of a piece.  Backed against the mantelshelf, throwing his right arm out along it sharply and heavily—­careless of the safety of clock and of ornaments—­as though overtaken by sudden weakness and seeking support.