“Did you hear what Sundran said?” she asked in a loud whisper. George nodded. “Do you think it’s true?” “I don’t know, dear.” “What shall you do to Lord Florencecourt if it is true?” “Do? Nothing.” “Won’t you? I shall.” “What?” “Kill him for having been cruel to my mother.” She was shaking from head to foot with passion, her eyes lurid as those of a tigress, her white teeth gleaming between thirstily parted lips, as if they would tear the flesh from the bones of the man whose imputed offence in being her father was not yet even proved. George was silent, beset by a crowd of conjectures no less mysterious than unpleasant. She suddenly leaped upon him, seizing his shoulders with small hands that griped tight as claws. “Well!” she said impatiently. “Well! You say nothing! I will have you say something. This Colonel of yours, who beat my mother, and left her and let her think he was dead--is he your respected dear friend now, or do you hate him with your whole soul, as I do?” “I can’t hate an old friend on the spur of the moment, especially when I don’t know what he’s done,” said George in a tone which had the effect of a few drops of water on a fire. “Don’t know what he’s done! Haven’t I told you all Sundran has said about the way he used to treat my mother, my beautiful darling mother; how he was harsh, and wicked, and jealous, and ran away from her when I was a little baby? Why did he call himself Captain Weston, when his real name was Lord Florencecourt, if he meant to be a good true husband to her? Was that like the noble English gentlemen you talk about, and poor mamma talks about?” “His name was not always Lord Florencecourt,” said George rather meekly. He knew that the Colonel’s name had never been Captain Weston; and that there were circumstances in this affair of which Lord Florencecourt was by no means proud had been amply shown by the mixture of constraint, dislike, and fear which had marked his behaviour to Nouna since his first meeting with her at the barracks. “And perhaps Sundran was mistaken,” he suggested in the same tone.