Maud was very charming and very winning, of that there could be no doubt; and the more so from the little difficulties which arose in making herself understood to her neighbour. Her French was more broken and pretty than fluent, but her bright smiles and speaking gestures quite made up for lack of words; and Phil was more and more delighted with his sister, and more and more impatient to claim her as his own. He noticed, even when in company and entertaining guests at her table, how her eyes were turning continually to Tor, how her face lighted when their glances met, and how she tried to catch what he said, and to include him in her own talk. ‘How she does love him!’ thought poor Phil. ‘Will she ever love me like that? I should so hate to do anything to make her shrink from me. I will say nothing to-night, at any rate.’ This decision was a relief, and the short interval that he spent _tête-à-tête_ with Tor, passed more easily than might have been expected. Phil concealed the nervousness he felt, and Tor seemed always at his ease. The interview did not last long, for they soon rose by mutual consent, to join the ladies. Phil was glad to escape from his host, and fell readily into conversation with Miss Marjory Descartes, who attracted him by her bright, pleasant manner, and by her fluent, amusing speech. But he was not altogether easy as the conversation proceeded. He could not define the impression produced; but he certainly experienced some sensation which suggested the idea that he was being ‘turned inside out’ for Miss Marjory’s inspection. If it was so, it was so cleverly done that he was barely conscious of the operation. It might be all his morbid fancy, he told himself. Miss Marjory could not by any chance know anything. Tor would know better than to betray his own secret. Still he could not be quite comfortable, and the more he reviewed the talk afterwards, the less he liked it. He had committed himself, he feared, more than he had intended, and had not been clear as to his antecedents under cross-examination. He had come without a properly prepared story, and Miss Marjory had either found it out, or might have done so, if she had had any motive in her apparently innocent queries. Miss Marjory had half fascinated, half frightened him. He could not rid himself of the idea that she was in some way an ally of Tor’s, and in his confidence. If so, it boded ill for him, for he knew that a clever woman was a dangerous enemy; and what Miss Marjory had said of Tor’s likeness to Mr. Debenham and Maud seemed to imply that if an ally, she would be an unscrupulous one. Such remarks as hers must have been made in all simplicity, or else with a deep motive. Phil was inclined to believe the latter theory; though at times he accused himself of morbid fears, which led him to suspect danger where no danger was.