Borrowdean swung his eyeglass backwards and forwards. All the time he was thinking intensely.
"How long have you been here?" he asked.
"Very nearly two months," she answered. "Imagine it!"
"Quite long enough for your little idyll," he said. "Come, you know what the end of it must be. We need Mannering! Help us!"
"Not I," she answered, coolly. "You must do without him for the present."
"You are our natural ally," he protested. "We need your help now. You know very well that with a slip of the tongue I could change the whole situation."
"Somehow," she said, "I do not think that you are likely to make that slip."
"Why not?" he protested. "I begin to understand Mannering's firmness now. You are one of the ropes which hold him to this petty life—to this philandering amongst the flower-pots. You are one of the ropes I want to cut. Why not, indeed? I think that I could do it."
"Do you want a bribe?"
"I want Mannering."