"I know his kind though," said Miss Desmond. "And so you love him very much indeed, and you don't care for anything else,—and you think you understand him,—and you could forgive him everything? Then you may get him yet, if you care so very much—that is, if Betty doesn't."
"She doesn't. She thinks she does, but she doesn't. If only he hadn't written to her—"
"My dear," said Miss Desmond, "I was a fool myself once, about a man with eyes his colour. You can't tell me anything that I don't know. Does he know how much you care?"
"Yes."
"Ah, that's a pity—still—Well, is there anything else you want to tell me?"
"I don't want to tell anyone anything. Only—when she said she'd go away, I advised her where to go—and I told her of a quiet place—and Mr. Temple's there. He's the other man who admires her."
"I see. How Machiavelian of you!"—Miss Desmond touched the younger woman's hand with brusque gentleness—"And—?"
"And I didn't quite tell her the truth about Mr. Vernon and me," said Lady St. Craye, wallowing in the abject joys of the confessional. "And I am a beast and not fit to live. But," she added with the true penitent's instinct of self-defence, "I know it's only—oh, I don't know what—not love, with her. And it's my life."
"Yes. And what about him?"
"It's not love with him. At least it is—but she'd bore him. It's really his waking-up time. He's been playing the game just for counters all the while. Now he's learning to play with gold."