"You see," she agreed, "really, in my heart, all the time I trusted you, for I knew you would keep your word. I knew you would say nothing, but would just wait and wait until I told you what it was I needed done." Charnock turned abruptly towards her, and as he turned the book slipped off the table and fell to the ground. "But yesterday," he exclaimed in perplexity, "yesterday, here in this room, I gave you the assurance which you looked for. You believed a man would only help you for the one reason. Well, I told you that the one reason held with me; yet, at that moment, you rejected all help and service. You cried out, 'It's the friend I want, not the lover.'" "Because just at that moment I understood that my belief was wrong. I understood the shame, the horror, of the tricks I had played on you." "Tricks?" said Charnock. "Oh!" and as he stooped down to pick up the book he added in a voice of comprehension, "At last! You puzzled me yesterday when you said, 'To possess the friend you had had to _make_ the lover.'" "Yes," she said eagerly, "you understand? I want you to. I want you to understand to the last letter, so that you may decide whether you will help me or not, knowing what the woman is who asks your help. I sat down to trick you into caring for me if by any means I could. I did it deliberately, how deliberately you will see if you only open the book you hold. And it wasn't until I had won that I realised that I had cheated to win and could not profit by the gains. I won yesterday and yesterday I sent you away. Perhaps God kept you here." Charnock made no answer. He sat down at the table opposite to Miranda and turned over the leaves of the book, whilst Miranda watched him, holding her breath. He was not angry yet, but she dreaded the moment when he should understand the subject-matter of the book. The book was a collection of letters written by a great French lady at the Court of Louis XV. to a young girl-relative in Provence, and the letters were intended to serve as a guide to the girl's provincial inexperience. There was much sage instruction as to the best methods of handling men, "ces animaux effroyables, dont nous ne pouvons ni ne voudrons nous débarrasser," as the great lady politely termed them. In the margin of the book Miranda's pencil had scored lines against passages here and there. Charnock read out one:-- "Et prends bien garde de tellement diriger la conversation qu'il parle beaucoup de lui-même." "That accounts for the history of my life which I gave you in your garden," said Charnock. He was not angry yet; he was even smiling. "Yes," said Miranda, seriously; "but there's worse! Go on!" "Soyez sage, ma mie," he read, turning over a page. "On ne possede jamais un de ces animaux sans qu'on peut bien disposer d'un autre. Celui que tu aimes, t'aimera aussi si tu fais la cour a un deuxième. Ils ont bien tort qui disent qu'il ne faut que deux pour faire l'amour. Il faut au moins trois."