"Oh, Mr. Trent, I am so sorry to keep you waiting, but I must run up to my aunt for a moment."
She disappeared into the house, and then Oliver turned and met the eyes of Lesley's waiting-maid. And at the same moment he was aware—as one is sometimes aware of what goes on behind one's back—that Ethel, in her pretty autumn dress of fawn-color and deep brown, had come out upon the balcony of her house and was observing him.
"You, Mary?" said Oliver, in a stifled whisper.
The woman looked at him with hard, defiant eyes. "Yes, me," she said. "You ought to know that I couldn't do anything else."
He stood looking at her with a frown.
"This is the last place where you ought to have come," he said.
"Because they are friends of yours?" she asked. "I can't help that. I didn't know it when I came, but I know it now."
"Then leave," said Oliver, still in the lowest possible tone, but also with all possible intensity. "Leave as soon as you can. I'll find you another place. It is the worst thing you can do for your own interest to remain here, where you may be recognized."
"I can take care of that," said Mary Kingston, icily. "I'll think over it."
Oliver put his hand into his pocket as if in search of a coin. But Kingston suddenly shook her head. "No," she said, quickly, "I don't want it. Not from you."