‘Mr. Redgrave has gone —­ he called to say goodbye.’

‘So?’

Irritated by self-consciousness, revolting against a misinterpretation which would injure her vanity, though it was not likely to aim at her honour, Alma had recourse to fiction.

‘I daresay you guess? —­ Yes, and I refused.’

Miss Steinfeld was puzzled.  It did not astonish her that a girl should reject ten thousand pounds per annum, for that she was too high-minded; but she had thought it beyond doubt that Alma’s heart was engaged.  Here, it had seemed to her, was the explanation of a mystery attaching to this original young Englishwoman; unhoped, the brilliant lover, the secretly beloved, had sought her in her retirement.  And after all, it was a mistake.

‘I don’t care for him a bit,’ Alma went on.  ’It had to be got over and done with, that was all.’

She felt ashamed of herself.  In childhood she had told falsehoods freely, but with the necessity for that kind of thing the habit had fallen away.  Solace, however, was at hand, for the German girl looked at her with a new interest, a new sympathy, which Alma readily construed as wonder and admiration, if not gentle envy.  To have refused an offer of marriage from a handsome man of great wealth might be counted for glory.  And Alma’s momentary shame yielded to a gratification which put her outwardly at ease.

The restless night brought torment of the mind and harassed spirits.  Redgrave’s proposal echoed in the vacant chambers of her life, sounding no longer an affront, but an allurement.  Why, indeed, had she repelled it so unthinkingly?  It did not necessarily mean scandal.  He had not invited her to open defiance of the world.  ’You can absolutely trust me; I am discretion itself.  All resources are at my command.’  Why had she rejected with scorn and horror what was, perhaps, her great opportunity, the one hope of her struggling and sinking ambition?  She had lost faith in herself; in her power to overcome circumstances, not yet in her talent, in her artistic birthright.  Redgrave would have made her path smooth.  ‘I promise you a great reputation in two or three years’ time.’  And without disgrace, without shadow of suspicion, it would all be managed, he declared, so very easily.  For what alternative had she rebuffed him?

Redgrave’s sagacity had guided him well up to a certain point, but it had lost sight of one thing essential to the success of his scheme.  Perhaps because he was forty years of age, perhaps because he had so often come and seen and conquered, perhaps because he made too low an estimate of Bennet Frothingham’s daughter, —­ he simply overlooked sentimental considerations.  It was a great and a fatal oversight.  He went far in his calculated appeal to Alma’s vanity; had he but credited her with softer passions, and given himself the trouble to play upon them, he would not, at all events, have suffered so sudden a defeat.  Men of Redgrave’s stamp grow careless,