"Why doesn't she break off this miserable engagement with Trenby?" asked Ralph moodily.
"She won't. I think she would have done if—if—for Peter's sake. But not otherwise. She's got some sort of fixed notion that it wouldn't be playing fair." Penelope paused, then added wretchedly: "I feel as if our happiness had been bought at her expense!"
"Ours?" Completely mystified, Ralph looked across at her inquiringly.
"Yes, ours." And she proceeded to fill in the gaps, explaining how, when she had refused to marry him, down at Mallow the previous summer, it was Nan who had brought about his recall from London.
"I asked her if she intended to marry Roger, anyway—whether it affected my marriage or not," she said. "And she told me that she should marry him 'in any case.' But now, I believe it was just a splendid lie to make me happy."
"It's done that, hasn't it?" asked Ralph, smiling a little.
Penelope's eyes shone softly.
"You know," she answered. "But—Nan has paid for it."
The telephone hell buzzed suddenly into the middle of the conversation and Penelope flew to answer it. When she came back her face held a look of mingled apprehension and relief.
"Who rang up?" asked Ralph.