“Do you know I am becoming most frightfully curious about your father’s work?” he observed.

“Are you really?” she replied carelessly. “For my part, I wouldn’t even take the trouble to climb up the ladder into the workshop.”

“But you must know something about what is going on there?” Granet persisted.

“I really don’t,” she assured him. “It’s some wonderful invention, I believe, but I can’t help resenting anything that makes us live like hermits, suspect even the tradespeople, give up entertaining altogether, give up even seeing our friends. I hope you are not going to hurry away, Captain Granet. I haven’t had a soul to speak to down here for months.”

“I don’t think I shall go just yet,” he answered. “I want first to accomplish what I came here for.”

She turned her head very slowly and looked at him. There was quite a becoming flush upon her cheeks.

“What did you come for?” she asked softly.

He was silent for a moment. Already his foot was on the brake of the car; they were drawing near the plain, five-barred gates.

“Perhaps I am not quite sure about that myself,” he whispered.

They had come to a standstill. She descended reluctantly.