There was no doubt about the man's displeasure.
"He certainly would be interested, and I'm very much afraid you have made trouble. But you haven't told me why you did it."
"I spoke on the spur of the moment—without thinking."
"Without thinking clearly," Thorne corrected. "For all that, it's possible you had a kind of subconscious motive. You can't deny that you are prejudiced against Winthrop."
Alison was sensible of a certain relief, and she smiled at him. The man had shown some insight, but he had not gone quite far enough in his surmises, for it was not Winthrop but Lucy Calvert against whom she was prejudiced.
"What have I done?" she asked. "If it's any harm, I'm sorry."
Her companion's face relaxed. He never cherished his anger long.
"Well," he explained, "I'm afraid you have put Nevis on Winthrop's trail, though the thing's not certain. After all, it's possible that there's another reason for his interest."
"And that is?"
"He's a man with a weakness for pretty faces, which will probably get him into trouble by and by, though he's generally supposed to be a clever—philanderer. It's not quite the thing to abuse any one you don't like when he's absent, but in spite of that I can't help saying that he's absolutely unprincipled and should be avoided by every self-respecting woman."