“You must have seen some strange things last night to change your intentions and feelings so suddenly, Colonel Dacre.”
He was silent. Her calm effrontery was so startling that it seemed almost as easy at the moment to doubt his own eyes as to doubt her. But then she was only a fine actress, of course. She was so greedy of power that she could not bear to lose a single worshiper, and would have kept him at any cost if he showed that he was weak enough to give her his heart to toy with and break.
“The things that I saw last night were not strange,” he said hoarsely. “I dare say they would have seemed natural enough to any other looker-on, but, as I told you before, I am a miserable stupid; I believed in all women, and you above the rest; and now——”
“And now?” she echoed softly as he paused.
“And now I believe in none; and in you, least of all.”
“You are more candid than complimentary, Colonel Dacre.”
“Perhaps—I cannot flatter.”
“It would be almost better if you tried to acquire the accomplishment,” she returned haughtily. “People who pride themselves upon being frank are exceedingly bad company.”
“At any rate, I sha’n’t be in your way long, Lady Gwendolyn. I leave Turoy in a couple of hours.”
“For Borton Hall?”