Almost before I had time to collect my thoughts, she had introduced me, adding, a moment later, with one of her charming smiles: "And will you take Mrs. Gastrell in to dinner?" I was debating whether or not to refer to our previous meeting, at Maresfield Gardens, when Mrs. Gastrell herself solved the difficulty. "I wonder," she said, her great eyes very wide open, her gaze resting full on mine, "if you remember that we have met before. It was just before Christmas. You and Mr. Osborne called in the middle of the night to ask if Hugesson had lost his purse: we both thought it so kind of you." I remembered a good deal more than that, but I did not tell her so. I remembered too that she had seemed to speak sarcastically, almost mockingly, that night when she had said she thought it kind of Jack to have come out "all that way" just to inquire if Gastrell had accidentally left his purse at the club. She appeared now, however, to mean what she said, and so I only answered: "How, having met you once, Mrs. Gastrell, could I forget our meeting? What rather astonishes me is that you should remember me by sight, seeing that we spoke for a few minutes only." She smiled in acknowledgment of the compliment, and I found myself wondering how many men that terribly alluring smile of hers had enslaved from first to last. "Would you believe it," she went on almost without a pause, "we were very nearly burnt in a dreadful fire that broke out in that house on Christmas Eve. We only just managed to escape with a few of our belongings; we had not, I am thankful to say, anything very valuable there, because the house had been sub-let to us, so that the furniture was not ours." "You certainly were fortunate, in a sense," I answered, marvelling at her self-possession, and mentally asking myself if she spoke with conviction and whether I had, after all, formed a wrong opinion about her as well as about our hostess. Then I heard Gastrell's voice behind me, and that brought me to my senses. If such a man were a guest of Mrs. Stapleton's it seemed quite on the cards that men and women of equally bad character might also be included among her friends. I had several reasons for suspecting Mrs. Gastrell of duplicity, and I determined to remain on my guard.