Cicely interrupted.

'Does Willy know?'

'No. You see, I have come to you first.'

'How long have you known?'

'Since my stay with them last autumn. I suspected something then, just as I was leaving; and Miss Daisy confessed—when I was there in May. Since then she seems to have elected me her chief adviser. But, of course, I had no right to tell anybody anything.'

'That is what you like—to advise people?'

Marsworth considered it.

'There was a time'—he said, at last, in a different voice, 'when my advice used to be asked by someone else—and sometimes taken.'

Cicely pretended to light another cigarette, but her slim fingers shook a little.

'And now—you never give it?'