Claire, perceiving the nervous tension at which the girl was living, was wistfully troubled on her friend’s behalf, and confided her anxious bewilderment to Nick. “I think Blaise must be crazy,” she declared one day. “I’m perfectly convinced that he’s in love with Jean, and yet he appears prepared to stand by while Geoffrey Burke completely monopolises her.” Nick nodded. “Yes. I own I can’t understand the fellow. He’ll wake up one day to find that she’s Burke’s wife.” “Oh, I hope not!” cried Claire hastily. They were pacing up and down one of the gravelled alleys that intersected the famous rhododendron shrubbery at Charnwood, and, as she spoke, Claire cast a half-frightened glance in the direction of the house. She knew that Sir Adrian was closeted with his lawyer, and that he was, therefore, not in the least likely to emerge from the obscurity of his study for some time to come. But as long as he was anywhere on the place, she was totally unable to rid herself of the hateful consciousness of his presence. He reminded her of some horrible and loathsome species of spider, at times remote and motionless in the centre of his web--that web in which, body and soul, she had been inextricably caught--but always liable to wake into sudden activity, and then pounce mercilessly. “Oh, I hope not!” she repeated, shivering a little. “If she only knew what marriage to the wrong man means!... And I’m certain Geoffrey is the wrong man. Why on earth does Blaise behave like this?”--impatiently. “Anyone might think--Jean herself might think--he didn’t care! And I’m positive he does.” “If he does, he’s a fool. Good Lord!”--moodily kicking a pebble out of his path--“imagine any sane man, with a clear road before him, _not taking it!!_” He swung round towards her suddenly. “Claire, if there were only a clear road--for us! If only I could take you away from all this!” his glance embracing the grey old house, so beautiful and yet so much a prison, which just showed above the tops of the tall-growing rhododendrons. “Oh, hush! Hush!” Claire glanced round her affrightedly, as though the very leaves and blossoms had ears to hear and tongues to repeat. “One never knows”--she whispered the words barely above her breath--“where he is. He might easily be hidden in one of the alleys that run parallel with this.” “The skunk!” muttered Nick wrathfully. “_What’s that?_” Claire drew suddenly closer to him, her face blanching. A sound--the light crunching of gravel beneath a footstep--had come to her strained ears. “Nick! Did you hear?” she breathed. A look of keen anxiety overspread his face. For himself, he did not care; Adrian Latimer could not hurt him. But Claire--his “golden narcissus”--what might he not inflict on her as punishment if he discovered them together? The next moment it was all he could do to repress a shout of relief. The steps had quickened, rounded the corner of the alley, and revealed--Jean.