"Poynter," said he bluntly, "the circumstances of our separation at Sherrill's have engendered, with reason, a slight constraint. There was a night when you grievously misjudged me—"
"I am willing," admitted Philip politely, "to hear why I should alter my views."
"Mon Dieu, Poynter!" boomed the Baron in exasperation, "you are maddening. When you are politest, I fume and strike fire—here within!"
"Mental arson!" shrugged the Duke of Connecticut, relighting his cigarette with a blazing twig. "For that singular crime. Excellency, my deepest apologies."
The Baron stared, frowned, and laughed. One may know very little of one's secretary, after all.
"You are a curious young man!" said he.
The Duke of Connecticut admitted that this might be so. Hay, therapeutically, had effected an astonishing revolution in a nature disposed congenitally to peace and trustfulness. Local applications of hay had made him exceedingly suspicious and hostile. So much so indeed that for days now he had slept by day, to the total wreck of his aesthetic reputation, and watched by night, convinced that Miss Westfall's camp was prone to strange and dangerous visitors. Excellency no doubt remembered the knife and the bullet.
The Baron sighed.
"Poynter," he said simply, "to a man of my nature and diplomatic position, a habit of candor is difficult. I wonder, however, if you would accept my word of honor as a gentleman that I know as little of this treacherous bullet as you; that for all I am bound to secrecy, my sincerest desire is to protect Miss Westfall from the peculiar consequences of this damnable muddle, to clear up the mystery of the bullet, and for more selfish reasons to protect her from the romantic folly of the man with the music-machine!"
Philip, his frank, fine face alive with honest relief, held out his hand.