"I am a little ambitious," he ventured. "I do not wish to take my place amongst the rank and file. I want to be something different to you in life--more than any one else. If affection and devotion count, I shall earn my place." Her eyes were filled with tears as she gave him her hand. "Indeed," she assured him, "you are there already. You have been there in my thoughts for so long. If you wish to keep your place, you will find very little competition. I am rather a dull woman these days, and I have very little to give." He smiled confidently as he stopped a taxicab and handed her in. "May I not be the judge of that?" he begged. "Giving depends upon the recipient, you know. You have given me more happiness within this last half-hour than I have had since we parted in France." Some instinct of her younger days brought happiness into her laugh, a provocative gleam into her soft eyes. "You are very easily satisfied," she murmured. He laughed back again, but though he opened his lips to speak, the words remained unsaid. Something warned him that here was a woman passing through something like a crisis in her life, and that a single false step on his part might be fatal. He stood hat in hand and watched the taxicab turn up Park Lane. CHAPTER III There was a little flutter of excitement in the offices of Messrs. Kendrick, Stone, Morgan and Company when, at a few minutes after eleven the following morning, Wingate descended from a taxicab, pushed open the swing doors of the large general office and enquired for Mr. Kendrick. Without a moment's delay he was shown into Roger Kendrick's private room, but the little thrill caused by his entrance did not at once pass away. It was like the visit of a general to Divisional Headquarters. Action of some sort seemed to be in the air. Ideas of big dealings already loomed large in the minds of the little army of clerks. Telephones were handled longingly. Those of the firm who were members of the Stock Exchange abandoned any work of a distracting nature and held themselves ready for a prompt rush across the street. Even Roger Kendrick, as he shook hands with his client, was conscious of a little thrill of expectation. Wingate was a man who brought with him almost a conscious sense of power. Carefully, but not overcarefully dressed, muscular, with a frame like steel, eyes keen and bright, carrying himself like a man who knows himself and his value, John Wingate would have appeared a formidable adversary in any game in which he chose to take a hand. Whatever his present intentions were, however, he seemed in no hurry to declare himself. The two men spoke for a few minutes on outside subjects. Wingate referred to the garden party of the afternoon before, led the conversation with some skill around to the subject of Josephine Dredlinton, and listened to what the other man had to say.