“Not a bit—­only practiced in the jig-saw puzzle we call life.  Attach no special importance to what I have just said, or the possibilities I have just thrown out.  I may be altogether wrong.  I have only at present your word that Signor Doria is not a kind husband.  I may not agree with you when I know him better.  You may not be a judge.  Your first husband was perhaps so exceptional that the norm of husbands is unknown to you.  My mind is quite open on the subject, because I have often found that a wife knows much less about her husband’s character than do other people.  Remember that hate blinds quite as frequently as love; and love turned to hate is a transformation so complicated that it takes a cunning psycho-analyst to interpret it.  Therefore to know the importance of your fears, I must know more about you yourself.

“We’ll leave it at that—­and all you need think of me at present is that I want to serve you.  But I am an old bird, while Brendon, on the contrary, is still young; and youth understands youth.  Remember that in him you have a steadfast and faithful friend.  I shan’t be jealous if you can tell him more than you can tell me.”

Jenny’s lips moved and were again motionless.  He perceived that she had started to say one thing, but would now say another.  She took his big hand and pressed it between her own.

“God bless you!” she said.  “If I have you for a friend, I am content.  Mr. Brendon has been very good to me—­very, very good.  But you are more likely to serve Uncle Albert than he.”

They parted presently and Jenny returned to the house, while the detective, finding a comfortable chair under an oleander bush, sniffed the fragrance of the red blossom above him, regretted that his vice had largely spoiled his sense of smell, took snuff and opened his notebook.  He wrote in it steadily for half an hour; then he rose and joined Albert Redmayne.

The elder was full of an approaching event.

“To think that to-day you and Poggi meet!” he exclaimed.  “Peter, my dear man, if you do not love Virgilio I shall be broken-hearted.”

“Albert,” answered Mr. Ganns.  “I have already loved Poggi for two years.  Those you love, I love; and that means that our friendship is on a very high plane indeed; for it oftens happens that nothing puzzles us more infernally than our friends’ friends.  In our case, however, so entirely do we see alike in everything that matters, that it is beyond possibility you should be devoted to anybody who does not appeal to me.  By the same token, how much do you love your niece?”

Mr. Redmayne did not answer instantly.

“I love her,” he replied at length, “because I love everything that is lovely; and without prejudice I do honestly believe she is about the loveliest young woman I have ever seen.  Her face more nearly resembles that of Botticelli’s Venus than any living being in my experience; and it is the sweetest face I know.  Therefore I love her outside very much indeed, Peter.