He seemed to be turning something over in his mind as he paced to and fro.  At last, apparently, he came to a decision.

“I’ll do it,” he said aloud.  “It’s a possible chance of silencing her.”

He made his way downstairs, pausing at the door of the library, where Diana was poring over her letter to Joan.

“I find I must go out again,” he said.  “But I shall be back in time for dinner.”

Diana looked up in dismay.

“But you’ve had no tea, Max,” she protested.

“Can’t stay for it now, dear.”

He dropped a light kiss on her hair and was gone, while Diana, flinging down her pen, exclaimed aloud:—­

“It’s that woman again!  I know it is!  She’s rung him up!”

And it never dawned upon her that the fact that she had unthinkingly referred to Adrienne de Gervais as “that woman” marked a turning-point in her attitude towards her.

Meanwhile Errington hailed a taxi and directed the chauffeur to drive him to 24 Brutton Square, where he asked to see Miss Lermontof.

He was shown into the big and rather gloomy-looking public drawing-room, of which none of Mrs. Lawrence’s student-boarders made use except when receiving male visitors, much preferring the cheery comfort of their own bed-sitting-rooms—­for Diana had been the only one amongst them whose means had permitted the luxury of a separate sitting-room—­and in a few minutes Olga joined him there.

There was a curiously hostile look in her face as she greeted him.

“This is—­an unexpected pleasure, Max,” she began mockingly.  “To what am I indebted?”

Errington hesitated a moment.  Then, his keen eyes resting piercingly on hers, he said quietly:—­

“I want to know how we stand, Olga.  Are you trying to make mischief for me with my wife?”

“Then she’s asked you?” exclaimed Olga triumphantly.

“Diana has asked me nothing.  Though I have no doubt that you have been hinting and suggesting things to her that she would ask me about if it weren’t for her splendid, loyalty.  You have the tongue of an asp, Olga!  Always, after your visits, I can see that Diana is worried and unhappy.”

“How can she ever be happy—­as your wife?”

Errington winced.

“I could make her happy—­if you—­you and Baroni—­would let me.  I know I must regard you as an enemy in—­that other matter . . . as a ’passive resister,’ at least,” he amended, with a bitter smile.  “But am I to regard you as an enemy to my marriage, too?  Or, is it your idea of punishment, perhaps—­to wreck my happiness?”

Olga shrugged her shoulders, and, walking to the window, stood there silently, staring out into the street.  When she turned back again, her eyes were full of tears.