“The little fool has seen that the artist is more in my line, and is jealous,” he mused. “But what of that? She can’t harm me, though she may make things deucedly uncomfortable for me here. Query, will it really pay me to break with her? That remains to be seen. I’m by no means sure that Miss Stratton has money that I can secure, or that it would be as good a prospect to take up with her as to settle down here, with Phœbe to keep me. I think I must retain both irons in the fire for a few days longer. Stratton is so awfully infatuated that she will be only too glad to condone a flirtation with Phœbe.” In pursuance of this train of thought, Mr. Staines became very solicitous about Mrs. Dollman’s state of health, smiled quite tenderly at her, suggested that she should lie down to compose her nerves, and offered to take all the labours of carving off her hands. But it was not in Phœbe’s nature to restrain her feelings, and when he accidentally touched her hand in taking the carving-knife from her, she sprang away from him with such an agony of horror and repulsion in her face, that he could no longer doubt her real sentiments towards him, and everyone at the table could see that there was more beneath the surface than met the eye. As for Gregory Staines, he was thunderstruck, although he was able to keep both his actions and his facial expression under admirable control. “She has been told something about me,” was his savage inward comment. “Somebody has betrayed me, and the little idiot has been made the sharer of a secret that she cannot keep. Betrayal means enmity, and the presence of a betrayal argues the near proximity of an enemy. I have but one enemy whom I need fear, and she has been cleverly put off the scent. And, yet, who knows? The devil himself must be in her, for she has followed and traced me to all sorts of places, and why not here? Good God! I never thought of it! Surely it can’t be this woman who has flung herself at my head as if I were the God of Love in the flesh? But, after all, even if it were, what can she do to me? She dare not move openly, for no plans for my arrest can be made effectual on Spanish territory. If she has really traced me, I am safe for to-day, at all events. I must meet her with her own weapons, and if I find that Miss Stratton and my arch-enemy are one and the same, may the Lord have mercy on her soul!” The object of his meditations was not slow to observe that Mr. Staines had suddenly received food for thought, and was not deceived, even though he kept his countenance so cleverly. “I must be careful not to place myself for any length of time in his power,” she thought. “He is quite capable of murdering me, if his suspicions of my true identity are assured, and with me all hope of Harley’s salvation would die.”