Electra, in her excitement, found herself unable to stay upstairs at her accustomed tasks. She had to know what grandmother thought of this ill-bred woman. But speeding down, she saw grandmother in the garden path with Billy Stark. There they walked intimately arm-in-arm, and grandmother talked. There was something eager in the pose of her head. Evidently what she had heard quite pleased her, if only because it was some new thing. And there was Peter at the door. Instantly the light sprang renewed into Electra's eyes. Peter would do still better than grandmother to confirm her triumph, though at the moment even she charged herself to be lofty in her judgments and temperate in expressing them. Peter did not look at all like one who had himself heard unlovely news. His face glowed. There were points of light in his dark eyes. Rose had left them there, and Electra, with the sick certainty of the jealous, knew it. They went silently into the library, Peter holding, as well as he might, the lax hand hanging at her side. In the morning light of the room they faced each other, and she asked her question, the one that, unbidden, came leaping to her lips. "Did you meet her?" He knew whom she meant, for his thought, too, was full of her. "Yes," he said, and then swept even Rose aside as deflecting him from his purpose. "Electra, I have decided to go back to France." Immediately she thought she saw why. Rose was going and he had to follow. "What did she tell you?" she cried sharply. The pang that came astonished her, it was so savage. Even in the haste of the moment, she had time for a passing surprise that she could be so moved by Peter. He was looking at her with innocent perplexity. "Rose?" he said. "Nothing. I told her I was coming here and she--" He paused, for he was on the point of adding, "She sent me." Peter could see how ill-judged that would be. Electra, her proud glance on him, was considering, balancing probabilities. With his artist's eye he saw how handsome she was, how like, in the outer woman, to his imperial lady. Such spirit in her could only, it seemed, be spent for noble ends. "Has she told you?" asked Electra, and there was something, he saw, beyond what he suspected. Her voice rang out against her will: "No, she hasn't. She means, for some reason, not to tell you. But she has had to tell me." Peter was staring at her. "Has something happened to her?" he asked quickly. "I must know." That mysterious rage she was so unwilling to recognize got possession of her again. "It means a great deal to you," she breathed. "Of course it does," said Peter honestly. "Don't keep me dangling, Electra." Electra's mouth seemed to harden before his eyes. She looked like some noble and beautiful image of justice or a kindred virtue. "She thinks I shall not tell you," she declared. "But I shall. It is no more right for you to be deceived than it was right for me. I shall tell you."