He avoided looking at Caroline. He was not over sensitive, but something about this girl made him uncomfortable. "And if you want to know why she has done this, I am the person to tell you. She wanted to show me that she's a bit cleverer than I took her to be, and, by God! she's about done it! She's tricked me fairly; but if she thinks it ends at this she'll live to know her mistake. No one scores off me more than once in their life." His blustering return to anger made no effect on the girl sitting rigidly in the chair. "It can't be true," she was saying to herself wildly, over and over again. "It can't be true!" A timid knock sounded at the door. It was the cook with a cup of tea. Sir Samuel took the tea and sent the woman away. She went unwillingly. "I advise you to drink this," he said, advancing awkwardly enough. But Caroline refused the tea, whilst thanking him. "Why should you care so much?" asked Broxbourne; in that sullen way. "She's tricked you as well as me, and everybody else. I tell you, you don't know her. She's the sort of woman who looks like an angel, and has no more heart or conscience than--than my boot has. She's clever, though; I'll give her that much. By Gad! to think she should have had me like this! But if she thinks she's settled with me, she's a lot out. I wish her joy of Mr. Baynhurst. They're a good match. After sponging all he knew on the other chap, he walks off with the woman and the money. Well, I'll take pretty good care the beautiful Camilla don't show her face here again very soon. She may trick me; but she isn't out of the wood, for all that." He was getting excited now. "If I've held my tongue all this while, there's nothing to prevent my speakin' now.... And I think it's on the cards that our dear friends may have their honeymoon excursion brought to an end a little sooner than they expect. Forgery is a nasty offence, Miss Graniger.... It means seven years." Caroline looked at him with strained, incredulous, and miserable eyes. "What do you mean?" she whispered. "I mean that your dear friend Camilla is nothing better than a common thief; that she robbed me of four hundred pounds a year and a half ago." Caroline's lips turned white. "I will not believe you," she said; but the man hardly heard her. He was wound up; the whole venom of his wrath was let loose. Stamping to and fro, he laid bare the history of the last few weeks; coarsely, brutally he told the truth, ending with the part that had brought him to the house this morning. Caroline's very soul went out in an agony of pity for the woman who had been tortured by this man. If only she had known! If only Camilla had turned for help to her! Once started, Broxbourne seemed to have no end to his vituperation. "She thinks I'll never do it, but she might know me a little bit better. I'll soon show her! I tell you straight, when I leave this house I go to my lawyer, and give him orders to start proceedings right away."