There was not a trace of any emotion now about Mary. She watched her father rearranging his tie with a critical air; she began to discuss the flowers on the dinner table as if nothing had happened out of the common. She bore the brunt of the conversation all dinner time, for the others were strangely silent. From time to time Mary flashed a challenge from her eyes to Ralph, as if defiantly ignoring his views. And yet she dreaded her next meeting with Darnley. She knew him to be poor and friendless, she believed him to be of no particular family, but still she valued his good opinion deeply. She would have denied that if it had been put to her directly, but in her heart of hearts she could not disguise the true state of her feelings. "Why are you looking at me so?" she said. "Was I?" Ralph asked. "I had no idea that my looks betrayed me so badly. But I will discuss the matter with you when we are alone." It was an audacious speech, but it sounded quite naturally from Ralph's lips. Mary could feel the colour rising to her cheeks; she felt annoyed that she could not better control her feelings. For the rest of the meal she was silent like the rest, and said no more till Lady Dashwood gave the signal for departure. CHAPTER XXVI. IN RECKLESS MOOD Once the ladies had departed, Sir George brightened visibly. He reached out eagerly for the claret and drank two glasses rapidly. Ralph declined the decanters, and also the cigar that his host handed him. He contented himself with a cigarette; he replied more or less vaguely to Sir George's idle chatter. It seemed almost incomprehensible to him that a father could sacrifice a daughter to a scoundrel like Mayfield, and accept the situation as if it had been the most natural thing in the world. "I feel bound to have a few words with you, Sir George," he said presently. "More by accident than anything else I seem to have been dragged into your family secrets. We will not go into the reason why I was in a position to render you a service a night or two ago. It is unfortunate that that service should have proved useless, but it is more than probable than those papers will turn up again." "Never," Sir George said emphatically. "Mayfield will take care of that. He knows that so long as he holds the papers I am quite in his power. He will lend me the money to put me right in the comfortable assurance that at the expiration of six months it will come back to him again. Take him all in all, Mayfield is perhaps the most clever scoundrel that I have ever come across, which is saying a great deal." "You are convinced that Mayfield is a finished scoundrel, then?" "My dear fellow, what other conclusion could I come to? His every action proves it. He has worked this thing out in the most cold-blooded way. The fellow ought to be hounded out of society and kicked out of every respectable house. No club should tolerate him. He's a rascal clean through."