Mallinson flushed.  ‘Of course not,’ he said awkwardly.

Fielding turned on him quickly.  ’Then what made you tell Miss Le
Mesurier?’

Mallinson was too taken aback to deny the accusation.  ’Oh, Miss Le Mesurier,’ he replied, ‘knew already.’

‘She knew?  Who told her?’

‘Drake.’

Fielding drew in his breath and whistled.  His first feeling was one of distinct relief, that after all he had not been the means by which Clarice had come to her knowledge; his second was one of indignation against Drake.  He realised how a frank admission from Drake would outweigh in the girl’s susceptible nature the fact admitted.  ’What on earth induced him to reveal it?’

’I suppose he is a little more cunning than one took him for.  No doubt he saw the thing would get known sooner or later, and thought the disclosure had better come from himself.’

Fielding had been leaning to the same opinion, but the moment he heard it stated, and stated by Mallinson, he felt a certain conviction that it was wrong.  ‘I don’t believe that,’ he said sharply.

He was none the less, however, indignant with Drake.  To intermeddle at all in other people’s concerns was averse to his whole theory of existence.  But to intermeddle, and not very creditably, and out of the most disinterested motives of benevolence and expediency, and then to fail!  All this was nothing short of degrading.  He dined that night at his club, to which Drake had been elected, and lay in wait for him.  Drake, however, did not appear, and at ten o’clock Fielding went round to his rooms.

Drake was living in chambers on the Embankment, a little to the west of Hungerford Bridge.  As he was shown into the room, Fielding could not help noticing the plainness of its furniture and adornment.  The chairs were covered with a cheap red cretonne; there was an armchair or two with the high seat and long elbows, which seemed to have gone astray from a Peckham drawing-room; an ormolu clock under a glass shade ornamented the overmantel, and in the way of literature there was one book in the room—­Prescott’s Conquest of Peru—­and a copy of the Times.

Drake was seated at the table engaged in the study of a map of Matanga.  ‘Come in!’ he said cordially.  Fielding drew up a chair to the fire.  ’Have a drink?  The cigars are on the mantelshelf.’

Drake fetched a syphon and a decanter of whisky and mixed two glasses.  He handed one to Fielding, and brought his map to the fire.

‘Ah!’ said Fielding.  ‘There’s likely to be a rising in Matanga, I see.’

‘Very possibly.’

‘How will that affect you?’

’Not at all, I think.  It may delay things, of course, but it won’t take long, and, besides, it won’t touch the interior of the country.  There will be a certain amount of shouting in the capital and round the coast, perhaps a gun or two fired off, and then they’ll settle down under a new President.’