“But your brother told me last night,” I said, “that there was some—­’pull’ or other he had, that might make a difference if it came to desperate measures.”

“He didn’t tell you what it was?” she asked, and I knew at once that she was, after all, in her brother’s confidence.

“No, he gave me no idea,” I replied.

“He couldn’t ever use that,” she said decidedly.  “He told me about it this morning, before he went up to the Hall, and I—­”

“Dissuaded him?” I suggested, as she paused.

“No!  He saw it, himself,” she explained.

“It wasn’t like Arthur—­to think of such a thing, even—­at ordinary times.  But after his quarrel with Brenda on the hill—­if you could call it a quarrel, when, so far as I can make out, Arthur never said a word the whole time—­after that, and Brenda being so eager to face them all out, this morning; he got a little beyond himself.”

“Does Brenda know about this—­pull?” I asked.

“Of course not!” Anne replied indignantly.  “How could we tell her that?”

“I haven’t the least notion what it is, you see,” I apologised.

“Oh! it’s about old Mr. Jervaise,” Anne explained without the least show of reluctance.  “There’s some woman or other he goes to see in town.  And once or twice Arthur took him in the car.  They forget we’re human beings at all, sometimes, you know.  They think we’re just servants and don’t notice things; or if we do notice them, that we shouldn’t be so disrespectful as to say anything.  I don’t know what they think.  Anyhow, he let Arthur drive him—­twice, I believe it was—­and the second time Arthur looked at him when he came out of the house, and Mr. Jervaise must have known that Arthur guessed.  Nothing was said, of course, but he didn’t ever take Arthur again; but Arthur knows the woman’s name and address.  It was in some flats, and the porter told him something, too.”

I realised that I had wasted my sympathy on old Jervaise.  His air of a criminal awaiting arrest had been more truly indicative than I could have imagined possible.  He had been expecting blackmail; had probably been willing to pay almost any price to avoid the scandal.  I wondered how far the morning interview had relieved his mind?

“That explains Mr. Jervaise’s state of nerves this morning,” I remarked.  “I could see that he was frightfully upset, but I thought it was about Brenda.  I had an idea that he might be very devoted to her.”

Anne pushed that aside with a gesture, as quite unworthy of comment.

“But, surely, that really does give your brother some kind of advantage,” I went on thoughtlessly.  I suppose that I was too intent on keeping Anne in England to understand exactly what my speech implied.

She looked at me with a superb scorn.  “You don’t mean to say,” she said, “that you think we’d take advantage of a thing like that?  Father—­or any of us?”

I had almost the same sense of being unjustly in disgrace that I had had during the Hall luncheon party.  I do not quite know what made me grasp at the hint of an omission from her bravely delivered “any of us.”  I was probably snatching at any straw.