“It explains nothing.” Tom Tobin’s smile was disarming. “I wasn’t looking for news, and this will not get you in the paper. Far from it.
“I was keeping tab on you,” he added.
“Tab on me?” Her wide eyes registered astonishment.
“Well, sort of guarding you, if that sounds better. I did it for a very good reason, too.
“You see,” he leaned forward over the table, speaking in a voice scarcely above a whisper, “I know you better than you think. You are not Lorena LeMar.”
“Not—”
He held up a hand for silence. “No use!” he warned. “You are the little French girl, Petite Jeanne.
“No, I’ll not betray you.” He had read the consternation in her eyes. “Why should I? You—you’re doing a big thing for me.”
“For you?”
“You are planning to make a success of the scenario I wrote, ‘When the Dogwood Is in Bloom.’”