Garrett was laughing with her, as was his habit, for their flirtation from the first had been a desperate one. At eighteen, a girl views nothing seriously, except her hobbies. As they walked together she presented a very neat-ankled and dainty appearance in her short blue serge skirt, little fur bolero, blue French _beret_, and thick white gloves. In the brief time he had been her father's guest, he had not failed to notice how his presence always served to heighten the colour of her cheeks, or how frequently she met him as if by accident in all sorts of odd and out-of-the-way corners. He was not sufficiently conceited to imagine that she cared for him any more than she did for young Gould, though he never once saw him with her. He would scowl at them across the table; that was all. Of a sudden, as they went on through the leafless wood she halted, and looking into his face with her beautiful eyes, exclaimed with a girl's frankness: "I wonder, Mr Hebberdine, if I might trust you?--I mean if you would help me?" "Trust me!" he echoed very surprised, as their acquaintanceship had been of such short duration. "If you repose any confidence in me, Miss Blair-Stewart, I assure you I shall respect its _secrecy_." Her eyes met his, and he was startled to see in them a look of desperation such as he had not seen in any woman's gaze before. In that moment the mask seemed to have fallen from her, and she stood there before him craving his pity and sympathy--his sympathy above that of all other men! Was not his position a curious one? The very girl whom he had come to trick and to deceive was asking him to accept her confidences. "You are very kind indeed to say that," she exclaimed, her face brightening. "I hardly know whether I dare ask you to stand my friend, for we've only known each other two or three days." "Sufficiently long, Miss Elfrida, to win me as your faithful champion," the young man declared, whereupon her cheeks were again suffused by a slight flush. "Well, the fact is," she said with charming bluntness, "though I have lots of girl friends, I have no man friend." "There is Archie Gould," he remarked, "I thought he was your friend!" "He's merely a silly boy," she laughed. "I said a man friend--like yourself." "Why are you so anxious to have one?" She hesitated. Her eyes were fixed upon the spotless snow at their feet, and he saw that she held her breath in hesitation. "Men friends are sometimes dangerous, you know," he laughed. "Not if the man is a true gentleman," was her rather disconcerting answer. Then, raising her eyes again, and gazing straight into his face she asked, "Will you really be my friend?" "As I've already said, I'd only be too delighted. What do you want me to do?" "I--I want you to help me, and--and to preserve my secret." "What secret?" he inquired, surprised that a girl of her age should possess a secret.