"There is one little thing—one reason why I wanted you to come this afternoon, Mr. Breton."
Rachel got up, her eyes fixed intently upon Roddy's face. "No, Rachel, don't go. It concerns us all three." Roddy laughed. "I don't want any of us to take it very seriously. It is entirely between ourselves. I do hope," he went on more gravely, "that I haven't been takin' any liberty in arrangin' things like this, but it seemed to me the only way—just to stop, you know, the thing once and for all."
Breton had left the table and was standing in the middle of the room. A thousand wild thoughts had come to him. This was a trap—a trap that Rachel....
The room whirled about him—he put his hand on to the back of a chair to steady himself, then turned to Rachel, seeking her with his eyes.
He saw instantly in her white face and eyes, that never left, for an instant, her husband, that there was nothing here of which she had had any foreknowledge.
"It's only," said Roddy, "that somebody came to me, a few days ago, and told me that you, Mr. Breton, and my wife were on friendlier terms than I—well, than I would, if I had known, have cared for——"
Breton started forward. "I——" he began.
"No, please," said Roddy. "It isn't anythin' that I myself have taken, don't you know, for a second, seriously. I have only arranged that we three should come like this because—for all our sakes—if people are sayin' those things it ought to be stopped. It's hard for me, you see, bein' like this to know quite how to stop it, so I thought we'd just meet and talk it over."
Roddy drew a deep breath. He hated explaining things, he disliked intensely having to say much about anything. He looked round at Rachel with a reassuring smile to tell her that she need not really be alarmed.
She had left the table and stood facing both the men. Full at her heart, was a deep, glad relief that, at last, at last, the moment had come when she could tell everything, when she might face Roddy with all concealment cleared, when she might, above all, meet her grandmother's definite challenge and withstand it.