She had not admitted, in the afternoon, that she had a husband. She colored now as she tried to meet his gaze.
"Did I tell you there was such a person?"
"No," said Garrison, "you did not. I thought—— Perhaps that's one of the many things I am not obliged to know."
"Perhaps." She hesitated a moment, adding: "If you'd rather not go on——"
She lowered her eyes. He felt a thrill that he could not analyze, it lay so close to jealousy and hope. And whatever it was, he knew it was out of the bargain, and not in the least his right.
"It wasn't for myself I asked," he hastened to add. "I'll act my part till you dismiss me. I only thought if another man were to come upon the scene——"
The far-off sound of a ringing house-bell came indistinctly to his ears. Dorothy looked up in his face with a startled light in her great brown eyes that awoke a new interest within him.
"The bell," she said. "I heard it! Who could be coming here to-night?"
She slipped to the door, drew it open an inch, and listened there attentively.
Garrison was listening also. The door to the outside steps, in the hall below, was opened, then presently closed with a slam. The caretaker had admitted a caller.