As carefully as usual, as quietly as usual, she repeated the conversation, at Lord Harry's table; describing also the manner in which Mr. Vimpany had discovered her as a person who understood the French language, and who had cunningly kept it a secret. In this serious state of things, the doctor--yes, the doctor himself!--had interfered to protect her from the anger of her master, and, more wonderful still, for a reason which it seemed impossible to dispute. He wanted a nurse for the foreigner whose arrival was expected on that evening, and he had offered the place to Fanny. "Your ladyship will, I hope, excuse me; I have taken the place." This amazing end to the strange events which had just been narrated proved to be more than Iris was immediately capable of understanding. "I am in the dark," she confessed. "Is Mr. Vimpany a bolder villain even than I have supposed him to be?" "That he most certainly is!" Fanny said with strong conviction. "As to what he really had in his wicked head when he engaged me, I shall find that out in time. Anyway, I am the nurse who is to help him. When I disobeyed you this morning, my lady, it was to go to the hospital with Mr. Vimpany. I was taken to see the person whose nurse I am to be. A poor, feeble, polite creature, who looked as if he couldn't hurt a fly---and yet I promise you he startled me! I saw a likeness, the moment I looked at him." "A likeness to anybody whom I know?" Iris asked. "To the person in all the world, my lady, whom you know most nearly--a likeness to my master." "What!" "Oh, it's no fancy; I am sure of what I say. To my mind, that Danish man's likeness to my lord is (if you will excuse my language) a nasty circumstance. I don't know why or wherefore--all I can say is, I don't like it; and I shan't rest until I have found out what it means. Besides this, my lady, I must know the reason why they want to get you out of their way. Please to keep up your heart; I shall warn you in time, when I am sure of the danger." Iris refused to sanction the risk involved in this desperate design. "It's _you_ who will be in danger!" she exclaimed. In her coolest state of obstinacy, Fanny answered: "That's in your ladyship's service--and that doesn't reckon." Feeling gratefully this simple and sincere expression of attachment, Iris held to her own opinion, nevertheless. "You are in my service," she said; "I won't let you go to Mr. Vimpany. Give it up, Fanny! Give it up!" "I'll give it up, my lady, when I know what the doctor means to do--not before." The assertion of authority having failed, Iris tried persuasion next. "As your mistress, it is my duty to set you an example," she resumed. "One of us must be considerate and gentle in a dispute--let me try to be that one. There can be no harm, and there may be some good, in consulting the opinion of a friend; some person in whose discretion we can trust."