"Speak to Marius," he said, and stepped carelessly into the ballroom. Susannah sank into the chair by the little card-table; the music of "La Louvre" broke gaily on the stillness, that and the delicate steps of the couples returning to the ball-room. She put her hand before her eyes; only by a miserable effort did she keep back the tears. CHAPTER VIII MARIUS APPEALS The heavy coach rolled cumbrously over the cobbled streets, and the fitful flame of the lamp that lit the handsome interior showed the wan, troubled face of Susannah Chressham, colourless between the folds of bright hair, and the clouded countenance of Captain Lyndwood who sat opposite to her, wrapped in what seemed a passionate and seething silence. She, sitting up, and gathering her mantle together over her low blue dress with a mechanical gesture, was the first to speak. "I regret I could not find Selina again," she said. "I was sorry to leave without speaking to her--" She broke off; Marius was not in her confidence, nor indeed much in her thoughts, and she paused, wondering what she should reveal and what keep back. He half startled and half relieved her by his abrupt answer. "It was concerning that paragraph in the _Gazette_ you wished to see Rose, was it not?" "How did you imagine it?" she queried faintly. "The Countess informed me." This remark brought Miss Chressham to glance at him closely and to notice that he was flushed and frowning, obviously ill at ease and striving for control. "The Countess informed you!" she echoed. He beat his foot impatiently on the floor of the coach. "She had seen it, of course. She concluded you would wish to prevent a meeting between Rose and Sir Francis." He checked himself, then added in a lower tone, "She has no doubt it is true." Miss Chressham coloured in sheer anger. "She dared to put it so to you!" The sad grey eyes darkened with wrathful scorn. "Did she wish to enlist you as her champion?" "Is it surprising that she was angry?" he answered defiantly. "If it be true----" "It is true and she knows it," broke in Miss Chressham. "She hath good cause to know it. Selina wrote to my lord, and she--this woman--stole her letter and composed, from that and what she further knew or imagined, this paragraph in the _Gazette_." "The Countess!" cried Marius. "The Countess--that paragraph! Susannah, I do not believe it!" Miss Chressham answered with weary passion. "Believe it or no, it is true, true--and it was an action of a meanness, a vulgarity----" "I do not credit it," he interrupted vehemently. "After what she said to me." Susannah gave him a swift look. "She had no right to speak to you." The dusky blood flooded his agitated, handsome face. "Hath she no wrongs?" he asked desperately. "How have we behaved to her, any of us? And it has always been her money. Rose and Miss Boyle are in the wrong."