"Why, was it as bad as all that? Perhaps I'd better not know." "I want you to know. I'm trying to tell you--because of Barbara." "I can't see where Barbara comes in." "She came into the library while it was happening--" Fanny laughed and it disconcerted him. "While what was happening?" she said. "You'd better tell me straight out. I don't suppose it was anything like as bad as you think it was." "I'm only afraid of what Barbara might think." "Oh, you can trust Barbara not to think things. She never does." Dear Fanny. He would have found his job of explaining atrociously difficult with any other woman. Any other woman would have entangled him tighter and tighter; but he could see that Fanny was trying to get it straight, to help him out with all his honour and self-respect and dignity intact. Every turn she gave to the conversation favoured him. "My dear, I'm afraid she saw something that I must say was open to misinterpretation. It wasn't my fault, but--" No. The better he remembered it the more clearly he saw it was Elise's fault, not his. And he could see that Fanny thought it was Elise's fault. This suggested the next step in the course that was only not perjury because it was so purely instinctive, the subterfuge of terrified vanity. It seemed to him that he had no plan; that he followed Fanny. "Upon my word I'd tell you straight out, Fanny, only I don't like to give the poor woman away." "Mrs. Levitt?" said Fanny. "You needn't mind. You may be quite sure that she'll give _you_ away if you don't." She was giving him a clear lead. When he began he had really had some thoughts of owning, somewhere about this point, that he had lost his head; but when it came to the point he saw that this admission was unnecessarily quixotic, and that he would be far safer if he suggested that Elise had lost hers. In fact, it was Fanny who had suggested it in the first place. It might not be altogether a fair imputation, but, hang it all, it was the only one that would really appease Fanny, and he had Fanny to think of and not Elise. He owed it her. For her sake he must give up the personal luxury of truthtelling. The thing would go no further with Fanny, and it was only what Fanny had believed herself in any case and always would believe. Elise would be no worse off as far as Fanny was concerned. So he fairly let himself go. "There's no knowing what she may do," he said. "She was in a thoroughly hysterical state. She'd come to me with her usual troubles--not able to pay her rent, and so on--and in talking she became very much upset and er--er--lost her head and took me completely by surprise." "That," he thought, "she certainly did." "You mean you lost yours too?" said Fanny mildly.