“Listen,” she said, “are you perfectly certain that there is no one coming?”
He listened for a moment.
“I can't hear any one,” he answered. “They've started a four-handed game of pool in the billiard room.”
She smiled.
“Then I will disclose to you Henry's dramatic secret. See!”
She touched the spring in the side of the secretary. The false back, with its little collection of fishing flies, rolled slowly up. The large and very wonderful chart on which Sir Henry had bestowed so much of his time, was revealed. Lessingham gazed at it eagerly.
“There!” she said. “That has been a great labour of love with Henry. It is the chart, on a great scale, from which he works. I don't know a thing about it, and for heaven's sake never tell Henry that you have seen it.”
He continued to examine the chart earnestly. Not a part of it escaped him. Then he turned back to Philippa.
“Is that supposed to be the coast on the other side of the point?” he asked.
“I don't exactly know where it is,” she replied. “Every time Henry finds out anything new, he comes and works at it. I believe that very soon it will be perfect. Then he will start on another part of the coast.”