"It is somebody else." She searched my eyes. Then she asked, in an agonized whisper: "Not ... It isn’t ... Not Gibson, Miss?" "Yes," I answered, "Gibson." Susan turned half round and gazed over the sea. Her pretty country-girl’s figure shook with hardly pent feeling. For the first time I saw Susan bitter and angry. "I’m ashamed of him, Miss," she burst out. "I could never have believed it of him." Not knowing what to say, I refrained from saying it. Susan’s wrath waxed stronger. She turned upon me with something dangerously like active resentment. "You ... you knew last night, Miss?" she said, almost fiercely. "Certainly not, Susan," I replied. "Madame told me that an Englishman had asked her questions at Grandpont. But she didn’t know who he was, and I never asked her to describe him." "Then how do you know it is Gibson?" asked Susan, a very little less pugnaciously. "Because I’ve just seen him." Susan collapsed. "Where, Miss? where, Miss? ... Oh!" gasped Susan. "Come, come," I said, "I was quite as much annoyed as you are. I told Gibson very plainly what I thought about it. But, Susan, I must admit that there is some little excuse for him. Of course he hasn’t repeated to me a single word that he ever said to you, or that you ever said to him. But it is plain that he’s very fond of you. And he thinks you encouraged him. He says you haven’t sent him even so little as a postcard for a fortnight." Susan’s Amazonian ire had died down to a village beauty’s pout. "I can never forgive him, Miss," she said. "I wouldn’t have believed it of Gibson. Not to mention the disrespect to you, Miss Gertrude." "Never mind the disrespect to me," I answered, "I can look after that myself. No doubt it’s very silly and weak of him; but the point is, that Gibson is so badly in love that he’s madly jealous." "Please, Miss, you didn’t tell him about ... Lord Ruddington?" asked Mees Breegs in a fright. "Susan," I said, "I’m surprised. What are you thinking of? Unless you’ve told him yourself, he can’t have the faintest notion that there’s a Lord Ruddington in the case. But I can see he suspects there is somebody. That’s why he couldn’t sit quiet in England while his rival cuts him out in France." "I shall never forgive him, Miss," snapped Susan more conclusively than ever. "Don’t say that, Susan," I said; "or, if you say it, take care you don’t mean it." "But I do, Miss." "Then it’s nothing to be proud of. Don’t hate a man for merely loving you." "He ought to have stopped at home, Miss." "He ought. But he hasn’t. You see, Susan, I don’t know how it is, but you seem to have a way of making people do mad things. Gibson cares for you quite as much as Lord Ruddington does. But he hasn’t done anything madder than Lord Ruddington’s first letter, has he?"