“He knows I am pretty. He is an old man but he knows. Fräulein Hirsch once made me feel actually sick by telling me, in her meek, sly, careful way, that he liked beautiful girls and the people said he wanted a young wife and had his eye on me. I was rude to her because it made me so furious. _How_ did he know that woman so well? You see how bad I have been made!” “He knows nearly all Europe. He has seen the dark corners as well as the bright places. Perhaps he has saved other girls from her. He brought her to punishment, and was able to do it because he has been on her track for some time. You are not bad—but unjust. You have had too great a shock to be able to reason sanely just yet.” “I think he will always make me creep a little,” said Robin, “but I will say anything you think I ought to say.” On an occasion when Feather had gone again to make a visit in the country, Mademoiselle came into the sitting room with the round window in which plants grew, and Coombe followed her. Robin looked up from her book with a little start and then stood up. “I have told Lord Coombe that you wish—that I wish you to thank him,” Mademoiselle Vallé said. “I came on my own part to tell you that any expression of gratitude is entirely unnecessary,” said Coombe. “I _must_ be grateful. I _am_ grateful.” Robin’s colour slowly faded as she said it. This was the first time she had seen him since he had supported her down the staircase which mounted to a place of hell. “There is nothing to which I should object so much as being regarded as a benefactor,” he answered definitely, but with entire lack of warmth. “The role does not suit me. Being an extremely bad man,” he said it as one who speaks wholly without prejudice, “my experience is wide. I chance to know things. The woman who called herself Lady Etynge is of a class which—which does not count me among its clients. I had put certain authorities on her track—which was how I discovered your whereabouts when Mademoiselle Vallé told me that you had gone to take tea with her. Mere chance you see. Don’t be grateful to me, I beg of you, but to Mademoiselle Vallé.” “Why,” faltered Robin, vaguely repelled as much as ever, “did it matter to you?” “Because,” he answered—Oh, the cold inhumanness of his gray eye!—“you happened to live in—this house.” “I thought that was perhaps the reason,” she said—and she felt that he made her “creep” even a shade more. “I beg your pardon,” she added, suddenly remembering, “Please sit down.” “Thank you,” as he sat. “I will because I have something more to say to you.” Robin and Mademoiselle seated themselves also and listened. “There are hideous aspects of existence which are not considered necessary portions of a girl’s education,” he began. “They ought to be,” put in Robin, and her voice was as hard as it was young. It was a long and penetrating look he gave her.