"I promise you I will be quite calm; quite cool." And he embraced her fondly, closely, with passionate fervour. "Then you are mine once more?" he asked. She threw her arms round his neck, and kissed his lips, his eyes, his face. "Yes," she said, "I am yours. Do what you will with me." "Till we meet again," then said he; and he quitted the house. Eva, left alone, looked about her with a shudder, as if seeking the evil she dreaded. She was afraid--afraid for herself and for Frank, but chiefly for Frank. In an instant her fears had risen to intolerable horror. She heard her father's step in the passage: she recognised his shuffling tread. It was impossible to her to meet him just then; she snatched up a cloak and wrapped it about her, pulling the hood over her head, as she rushed out of doors. It was raining heavily. VI. Frank found Van Maeren at home. And Bertie saw at once that It had come. He read it in Frank's drawn face, heard it in the thick utterance of his voice. And at the same time he felt that the lax springs of his determination were trying to brace themselves in despair, in self-defence, and--that they failed. "Bertie," said Westhove. "I want to speak to you, to ask you something." Bertie made no reply. His legs quaked. He was sitting in a large cane-chair, and he did not move. "I have just met Eva," Frank went on, "and I went with her to see her father. Sir Archibald tells me that they have been here some weeks--" Still Bertie spoke not; he gazed up at Frank with his deep, black eyes, and their brilliancy was overcast by distress and fear. Frank stood in front of him, and he now passed his hand over his brow in some confusion. He had at first purposed to tell his story, and then, quite calmly, to ask a question; but something, he knew not what, in Bertie's cat-like indolence, roused his anger, made him furious with him for the first time in all the years he had known him. He was angry that Bertie could stay there, half lying down languidly at ease, his graceful hand hanging over the arm of the lounge; and he did not detect that his attitude at this moment was assumed merely to conceal an all too overwhelming agitation. And Frank's intention of telling a logical tale and asking a plain question suddenly collapsed in rage, giving way to a mad desire to know at once--at once-- "Listen to me, Bertie. You remember the three letters that I wrote before we left London. Eva tells me that they were kept back by their servant William. Do you know anything about it?" Bertie was silent, but his eyes were fixed on Frank with dull, anxious entreaty. "No one knew of the existence of those letters but you. Have you any suspicion why it should be to William's interest to suppress them, then?" "No. How should I?" said Bertie, scarcely above his breath. "Come, come--speak out!" cried Westhove, quivering in every muscle. "You must know something about it, that is quite clear. You must. Speak out."