"Leonard Dowson!" Toni smiled drearily. "Think of leaving Owen for Leonard Dowson!"
"Oh, I know he's not in the same class," said Eva, with ostentatious frankness, "and I don't for a moment suppose he would make you happy. I'm afraid I wasn't thinking much of you, dear, when I mentioned his name. Somehow I forgot that you have as much right to happiness as anyone."
"My happiness doesn't matter," said Toni for the second time. "But I think you are wrong, Eva. Mr. Dowson never thinks of me—now."
"Doesn't he?" Eva permitted herself to smile. "My dear child, he's just crazy about you. He told me all about it one day when you weren't there—how he'd loved you for years and years and was heart-broken when you refused him. He only came down here to be near you, and if you would only smile on him a little he would do anything in the world for you."
"He wouldn't give up his work for me, Eva."
"Ah, you haven't heard of his good luck." Eva had carefully refrained from the announcement until the moment was ripe. "He has just come into some money—nearly two hundred a year; and he can chuck dentistry to-morrow, if he likes."
"Even then, he wouldn't want a scandal——"
"Oh, Toni, I could shake you," said Eva, sitting down with a thump on the sofa near her. "Because some people have not got red blood in their veins, you think no one has. I tell you Leonard Dowson would throw up everything to-morrow—brave any amount of scandal, if only you would go with him. He could take you abroad somewhere, America perhaps; and then, when your husband had got his divorce, you could marry Leonard and settle down as nicely as possible. Then Owen would be free to do as he chose with his life, and this unhappy state of things would be forgotten."
"Marry him? Marry Leonard Dowson?" Even yet Toni could not assimilate the idea.
"Well, why not? He is madly in love with you, Toni. He would give up everything in the world for you, and I honestly think that things are impossible as they are. But of course you know better than I do, and if you feel you must stay with your husband——"