Beatrice started and looked up at him as though she thought he might be joking. His face had indeed undergone a change, but there was something stern, resolute, almost brutal in the hard-set profile.
"Indeed? Will that not be more difficult? There is Stafford in the way, and Stafford—"
"Stafford must be cleared out of the way," he interrupted, with a cool decision which his expression partly belied. "I believe she is fond of him and he of her in a Platonic sort of fashion which might lead to marriage and might not. He is not the danger. There is a fellow, Nicholson, though—"
He stopped short and seemed for an instant to be plunged in his own thoughts.
"Who is this Nicholson?" she asked curiously. "I have heard his name constantly since I have been here. People talk of him as though he were a demigod. Why are you afraid of him?"
"Just because of his godlike qualities," Travers explained, with a laugh. "In earlier ages, no doubt, he would have been a god and among the natives he is one. In reality, he is an ordinary mortal blessed with an extraordinary influence. I believe he is a captain in some native regiment on the frontiers and has done grand work there. I heard today that he is coming down to Marut on leave."
"Oh—?"
"He was Lois' old playfellow," Travers added pointedly.
"And so you are afraid of him?"
"All women adore heroes of that type," he remarked without mockery or bitterness, "and when Nicholson appears I have a fair idea that Stafford and I will have to be content with the back seats in Lois' affections. You see, they were great friends, and moreover the Carmichaels have their matrimonial eye on him. So it's now or never as far as I am concerned."