“Well, there is such a thing as knowing people too well,” said Loring deliberately. “And then you find out little traits that don’t do. To tell you the truth, Romayne and I have quarrelled.” “I’m glad of that,” said Miss Pomeroy softly. He looked at her quickly, but he was not quick enough to catch the spiteful gleam in her eyes. “Would it be inquisitive to enquire why?” he said. “I don’t think Mr. Romayne is a nice young man,” was the answer. “I would rather people I like----” She broke off in pretty confusion. “I would rather you weren’t a friend of his, Mr. Loring. I think there’s a great deal about him that nobody knows.” “Indeed!” said Loring, interrogatively and quietly. “You see,” she said, with charming seriousness, “I think a girl can often feel whether a man is nice or nasty quicker than another man can. Mr. Loring, has Mr. Romayne ever said anything to you--Oh, please don’t think it’s very odd of me to say such things to you! Has he ever said anything that made you think he might be married?” There was a hardly perceptible pause--a hardly perceptible flash of comprehension on Loring’s face, and the vindictive satisfaction in his eyes deepened. “What makes you ask me that?” he said, in a tone which seemed to fence gravely with the suggestion rather than to repudiate it. Miss Pomeroy responded with growing conviction. “Because I’m quite sure that he is married. And, of course, as he doesn’t own it, there must be something--something not nice about it. And it does seem to me so wrong that people should like him so much when he isn’t a bit what they think he is.” The man’s eyes and the girl’s eyes met at that moment for the first time. The girl’s were perfectly clear, mild, and expressionless, and into the man’s there stole a cynical tinge of admiration. “By Jove,” he said to himself, “she is clever!” At that instant Mrs. Pomeroy’s voice was heard from the drawing-room calling placidly for her daughter. And Miss Pomeroy moved forward with graceful promptitude into the drawing-room. “We shall meet in Scotland by-and-by, I believe,” said Loring pleasantly, as he shook hands with Miss Pomeroy. “You were to be at the Stewarts’, I believe, in the last week of September, and so am I. I shall look forward to it. Good-bye, Miss Pomeroy.” “Good-bye, Mr. Loring.” A few minutes later Loring also took leave of Lady Bracondale and went away. The satisfaction was stronger than ever in his eyes. Maud Pomeroy’s words had somehow or other carried instantaneous conviction to his mind, and in the fact he believed them to contain he saw certain social ruin for Julian Romayne. “He’s done for himself all round,” he said to himself as he let himself into his rooms half an hour later. “That nice little house in Chelsea will be to let next season.”