“I don’t control my daughter’s affections, sir; she will do as she wishes.  I merely say it will be against my hopes and judgment if she marries you.  I imagine you’ve not altogether waited for my leave.  I was not blind to the way you hung about her at Wiesbaden, Mr. Fiorsen.”

Fiorsen answered with a twisted, miserable smile: 

“Poor wretches do what they can.  May I see her?  Let me just see her.”

Was it any good to refuse?  She had been seeing the fellow already without his knowledge, keeping from him—­him—­all her feelings, whatever they were.  And he said: 

“I’ll send for her.  In the meantime, perhaps you’ll have some refreshment?”

Fiorsen shook his head, and there followed half an hour of acute discomfort.  Winton, in his mud-stained clothes before the fire, supported it better than his visitor.  That child of nature, after endeavouring to emulate his host’s quietude, renounced all such efforts with an expressive gesture, fidgeted here, fidgeted there, tramped the room, went to the window, drew aside the curtains and stared out into the dark; came back as if resolved again to confront Winton; then, baffled by that figure so motionless before the fire, flung himself down in an armchair, and turned his face to the wall.  Winton was not cruel by nature, but he enjoyed the writhings of this fellow who was endangering Gyp’s happiness.  Endangering?  Surely not possible that she would accept him!  Yet, if not, why had she not told him?  And he, too, suffered.

Then she came.  He had expected her to be pale and nervous; but Gyp never admitted being naughty till she had been forgiven.  Her smiling face had in it a kind of warning closeness.  She went up to Fiorsen, and holding out her hand, said calmly: 

“How nice of you to come!”

Winton had the bitter feeling that he—­he—­was the outsider.  Well, he would speak plainly; there had been too much underhand doing.

“Mr. Fiorsen has done us the honour to wish to marry you.  I’ve told him that you decide such things for yourself.  If you accept him, it will be against my wish, naturally.”

While he was speaking, the glow in her cheeks deepened; she looked neither at him nor at Fiorsen.  Winton noted the rise and fall of the lace on her breast.  She was smiling, and gave the tiniest shrug of her shoulders.  And, suddenly smitten to the heart, he walked stiffly to the door.  It was evident that she had no use for his guidance.  If her love for him was not worth to her more than this fellow!  But there his resentment stopped.  He knew that he could not afford wounded feelings; could not get on without her.  Married to the greatest rascal on earth, he would still be standing by her, wanting her companionship and love.  She represented too much in the present and—­the past.  With sore heart, indeed, he went down to dinner.

Fiorsen was gone when he came down again.  What the fellow had said, or she had answered, he would not for the world have asked.  Gulfs between the proud are not lightly bridged.  And when she came up to say good-night, both their faces were as though coated with wax.