He stooped down and pressed his lips to hers almost fiercely. She tore herself free, and her bosom heaving with indignation, her cheeks crimson with shame, she rushed from the room and from the house. When the door was closed behind her, Marston’s manner altered instantly. A smile passed across his face—a smile of extreme self-congratulation. ‘I think I shall win her over yet,’ he said softly. ‘Poor Ruth! There are a few sparks of the old love left, even in my cold heart. I want a wife, too, and she must be a lady. A bachelor can’t get the right set of people round him. Poor Ruth! how capitally she wears.’ He paced the room for a minute or two, and then he looked at his watch. ‘I must go and warn Heckett,’ he said, ‘that there’s a traitor in the camp somewhere. That girl has heard him say something, and has told Ruth. That link must be broken, at any rate.’ Marston did not attach any serious importance to what Ruth had told him. He gave a shrewd guess at the source of her information and what it was worth. Still, as he had further need of Heckett’s services, and as that worthy’s house was, for the present, the centre of some rather important operations, he thought it just as well to investigate the matter at once. If Miss Gertie was in the habit of listening to conversations and reporting them to customers, the sooner Miss Gertie had a little change of air and scene the better. CHAPTER XXV. GEORGE HAS ‘THE STRAIGHT TIP.’ George had got on capitally in his situation. He found the Work remarkably easy, the salary was paid regularly, and he was earning the sweet bread of independence—the first he had ever tasted in his life. He had some vague idea that he wouldn’t always be a city clerk. He didn’t believe that his father’s temper would last. Eventually, of course, he would be forgiven, the prodigal would return by special invitation, plus a Mrs. Prodigal, the fatted calf would be killed, and George, having proved that he was of some use in the world, and could earn money as well as spend it, would settle down to a country life. Bess’s father would have a nice little cottage somewhere, and everything would come right. But George was not going to make the first advance. His father had cast him off, and cast off he would remain till he was sent for. He didn’t even let his father know his whereabouts or that he was married. Bess wrote once to her father to say she was in London and well and happy, and she hoped he would have faith in her and believe all she had done was for the best. But she gave no address, for George was determined to cut himself completely adrift from old associations. For the present he was Mr. George Smith, and nothing that concerned Mr. George Heritage concerned him. Bess was very happy; she would have been happier still if she might have told her father all, looked up with unblushing cheeks in his dear old face and asked his blessing.