“I should be compelled to do that in any case,” he answered quietly. “I cannot relinquish the work on which I started until I know what has become of the man who is known at headquarters as Koona Dick. Some one must know about him—probably the driver of the sled whose trail I followed, and I’ve got to find out. Vague reports are not regarded as satisfactory by the heads of the force.”
“You will let me know?” she asked instantly.
“I shall be glad to do so,” he answered quietly, and again he was conscious of the tightening about his heart.
“You see,” she explained, “my position is so anomalous. All my little world with the exception of my Newnham friend and yourself, my foster-sister, whom I told only last night, thinks of me as a spinster.”
“You are sure Mr. Rayner does not know of your marriage?” asked the corporal quickly, as a thought struck him.
“I am quite sure,” answered Joy readily, without giving any indication that she found any special significance in the question. “You see the part played by Lady Alcombe was not very credible, and I used my knowledge of it to ensure her silence. I wrote to her and told her that if the wedding was not kept secret, I should proclaim all that had happened to the world. Her vulnerable spot is the position she holds in society, and she knew how that would suffer if it became a matter of common knowledge that for a bribe she had schemed to marry to a scamp an innocent girl left in her charge. She wrote me a short note in reply, in which she said, that she would forget that the marriage had even taken place, and that I need not fear that it would ever become known. That is why I am so sure Mr. Rayner does not know. Lady Alcombe dare not betray me.”
Bracknell nodded. “I dare say you are right, but of course you cannot marry again until you are sure of that—”
“I do not want to marry again!” interrupted the girl quickly, the blood flaming in her pale face. “Why should you think that I do, Mr. Bracknell?”
As the corporal met her blue eyes, clear and unshadowed by guile, his heart grew suddenly light, and on the moment he dismissed from his mind the thought that Joy Gargrave in any way shared Mr. Rayner’s aspirations. He laughed cheerfully as he replied, “I did not say that I thought you wished to marry again, Miss Gargrave. I was merely stating the law on the matter, and there is no personal significance to be attached to such a statement.”
Joy Gargrave smiled austerely. “I am not likely ever to marry again,” she said. “Once bitten, twice shy, you know.”