She turned to him, lucid and triumphant.
"Could any other woman have done it? Do you see Mary Probyn doing it?"
"Not that way."
"It was the only way. You must," she said, "have temperament."
The word took Straker's breath away.
"You didn't like the way I did it. I can't help that. I had to use the means at my disposal. If I hadn't led him on how could I have got hold of him? If I hadn't led him further how could I have got him on an inch?"
"So that," said Straker quietly, "is what you did it for?"
"You've seen him," she answered. "You don't seriously suppose I could have done it for anything else! What possible use had I for that young man?"
He remembered that that was what she had said about Mr. Higginson. But he confessed that, for a lady in a disconcerting situation, she had shown genius in extricating herself.
Fanny's house party broke up and scattered the next day. A week later Straker and Will Brocklebank saw Furnival in the Park. He was driving a motor beyond his means in the society of a lady whom he certainly could not afford.