I remained silent, greatly perturbed in mind. For there flashed across me those words of Warcop’s, spoken on the morning of my departure, when I sat with him in his sanctum, dedicated to the mysteries of the stud-farm and the chase: ‘By times they—Marsigli and Mamzell—are as thick as thieves. By times they fight like cat and dog or’—with a knowing look—‘like man and wife.’ There flashed across me, too, a strange speech of Fédore’s I had overheard, as I walked along one of the innumerable dimly lighted passages at Hover, one night, on my way from the library, where I had worked late, to my own study. To whom she spoke I did not know, for a door was hastily closed immediately I passed, though not hastily enough to prevent my hearing a man’s voice answer.—‘Ah! you great stupid,’ she had said. ‘Why not what these English call feather your own nest? I have no patience with you when, if you pleased, you could so easily be rich.’—The episode made an unpleasant impression upon me at the time, but had almost faded from my mind. Now in the light of my conversation with Halidane it sprung into vivid relief. The loss of a few thousand pounds’ worth of jewels and plate was a small matter. But that Mademoiselle Fédore should remain in the household as Marsigli’s accomplice—and that she was his accomplice I suspected gravely—perhaps to regain her power over the boy, was intolerable. As to her assisting the police by pointing out the probable route of the delinquent, what easier than to do so with a view to putting them on a false scent? ‘This is indeed ugly news,’ I said at last. ‘I wonder if the Master knows.’ ‘Why not? It was reported in the papers at the time.’ ‘Ah! and I was absorbed in my work and missed it. How unfortunate!’ ‘Do you think you know anything, then?’ he said greedily, with sharp interest. But the question I did not answer, perceiving he was curiously anxious to be taken into my confidence. CHAPTER XXIV. I sat long, till the fire in the grate burnt low and the chill of the winter night drove me shivering to my bed, revolving this conversation in my mind. If it could be proved that Mademoiselle Fédore was in league with the Italian, still more, if it could be proved she and he were married, Hartover could be permanently set free from her intrigues and her influence. I did not want to be vindictive; but with every fibre of my being I wanted to free the boy. For, as I realised in those lonely midnight hours, while the wind rumbled in the chimneys and roared through the bare branches of the elms in the Fellows’ Garden just without, the boy’s redemption, the boy’s growth into the fine and splendid character he might be, could be—as I believed—even yet, was dearer to me than any advantage of my own.