She observed at once that something was troubling him--not a matter which had affected him suddenly, but rather an uncertainty which seemed to have been progressing for some time. He remained beside her silent for several minutes while they looked out at the lights of the little French hamlets. Finally he asked her in quite an ordinary tone, so that the French women could not suspect any challenge: “You remember motoring down this way to Blois and Tours, and then that run down the valley of the Loire?” Ruth startled a little straighter and gazed out at the darkness without answering. If Gerry Hull had asked her such a question she would have bluffed the answer boldly; but Hubert had interrogated her for a purpose; and he knew something of what Cynthia Gail had done and had not done. Suddenly it dawned upon Ruth that that time, nine years earlier, when Hubert had last seen Cynthia Gail, was not in Chicago, as she had supposed, but here in France. “Yes, I remember,” she replied weakly and without looking about. “Your father and mother were with you, and my father--he was alive then--and I; and who else was along?” he questioned, as though quite casually, but Ruth knew that this was a test. “I--don’t remember,” she faltered. She doubted whether Cynthia Gail had been with him on any such trip; the whole question might merely be a catch; well, if he suspected her and wanted to catch her, certainly he had her. Her progress from the moment of her appearance as Cynthia Gail had been made possible--she recognized--because of his unsuspecting acceptance of her. That had won for her championship in more powerful quarters which, in turn, had gained her favor more influential still; yet the whole pyramid of that favor balanced on the point of Hubert’s original acceptance. So she sat in the dark awaiting what this strange friend of hers should determine to do. The French women in the opposite seats conversed between themselves. The train was drawing into Paris, they said. The rapid rattle of railroad joints and crosstracks confirmed this to Ruth, as well as the more frequent noise of engines passing; she could see, too, low shaded signal lights. But the environs of Paris had become more black than the villages of the south; this was from danger of repetition of the severe air raids of which Ruth had heard at Bordeaux. The train stopped; not at a station, nor did guards open the doors. Everything was black without; the few lights, which Ruth had been viewing, either had not been necessary thereabouts, or else they had been extinguished; and, with the stilling of the train noise, a weird, wailing moan rose through the night air.