“You see they do not tell you where she is,” she said, trying to speak naturally, though there was a kind of defiant tone in her voice. “And you need not make any further inquiries. I might not like her, and if I brought her here I should feel obliged to keep her.” She looked straight at Mr. Beresford, who nodded assent to what she said, but was not wholly deceived. That the erasure had something to do with Christine he was certain, and, with his curiosity roused by Reinette’s excited manner, he resolved to ascertain for himself who and what the woman was. He, too, had the address of her authorized agent, and the mail for New York which left Merrivale next day carried two letters, one in English and one in French, directed to M. Jean Albrech, Mentone, France, and in the one written in French was a note for _Christine Bodine_, in whom Reinette had implicit faith as a true, good woman, notwithstanding what the Messrs. Polignie had insinuated against her. They were vile, suspicious people, Reinette said to herself, who, because her father paid money to a poor woman, thought she must be bad. They did not know, as she did, how kind and faithful Christine had been to her mother, who asked that she should be rewarded and cared for, and this was the way her father had done it. Thus Queenie reasoned and tried to reassure herself, but for days there was a shadow on her bright face and a dull pain in her heart as she wondered what the mystery could be concerning the woman Bodine. But Queenie could not be unhappy long, and in visiting Margery as she did every day, and calling upon her cousins at the Knoll, and watching what had become a decided flirtation or rather genuine love affair between Major Rossiter and Anna, she recovered her spirits, and resuming her old, fascinating manner with Mr. Beresford and Phil, drove them both to the point of seeking to know their fate, whether for good or evil. CHAPTER XXIV. “I LOVE YOU, QUEENIE.” Mr. Beresford was the first to say it. As he did not often see Phil and Queenie together, except in company with Grace and Ethel, or Anna, he had no reason to know how much they were to each other, or he might not have been as confident of success as he was when at last he made up his mind to speak and know the worst or best there was to know. It had been his boast that no woman living could affect his happiness one way or the other. As a general thing he did not believe in them; that is, did not believe them real, or worth the love so many strong, sensible men wasted upon them.