The next morning, with the May sunshine streaming in through the open window, it was easier to laugh at her nocturnal fears, and to trace the odd phrases which, snatched from the previous day’s conversation with Burke and Tormarin and jumbled up together, had supplied the nightmare horror of her dream. But, even so, it was many days before she could altogether shake off the disagreeable impression it had made on her. CHAPTER XIV.--A COMPACT “YOU don’t like Jean Peterson.” Burke made the announcement without preface. He and Judith were sitting together on the verandah at Willow Perry, where their coffee had been brought them after lunch. Judith inhaled a whiff of cigarette smoke before she answered. Then, without any change of expression, her eyes fixed on the glowing tip of her cigarette, she answered composedly: “No. Did you expect I should?” “Well, hang it all, you don’t hold her accountable for her father’s defection, do you?” A dull red crept up under Mrs. Craig’s sallow skin, but she did not lift her eyes. They were still intent on the little red star of light dulling slowly into grey ash. “Not accountable,” she replied coolly. “I look upon her as an unpleasant consequence.” She bent forward suddenly. “Do you realise that she might have been--my child?” There was a sudden vibrating quality in her voice, and for an instant a rapt look came into her face, transforming its hard lines. “But she isn’t. She happens to be the child of the man I loved--and another woman.” “You surely can’t hate her for that?” “Can’t I? You don’t know much about women, Geoff. Glyn Peterson stamped on my pride, and a woman never forgives that.” She leaned back in her chair again, her face once more an indifferent mask. Burke sat silent, staring broodingly in front of him. Presently her glance flickered curiously over his face. “Why does it matter to you whether I like her or not?” she asked, breaking the silence which had fallen. Burke shifted in his chair so that he faced her. His eyes looked far more red than brown at the moment, as though they glowed with some hot inner light. “Because,” he said deliberately, “I’m going to marry her.” Judith sat suddenly upright. “So that’s the meaning of your constant pilgrimages to Staple, is it?” “Just that.” She laughed--a disagreeable little laugh like a douche of cold water. “You’re rather late in the field, aren’t you?” “You mean that Blaise Tormarin wants her?” “Of course I do. It’s evident enough, isn’t it?” Burke pulled at his pipe reflectively. “I should have thought he’d had a sickener with Nesta Freyne.” “So he had. But not in the way you mean. He never--loved--Nesta.” “Then why on earth did he ask her to marry him?”