"I notice everyone's sorry for the girl," retorted Gilbert, a little bitterly. "I think the girl can take care of herself, and I think, even if it came to the point where she understood the real truth of the matter, she would come also to understand my motive."
"Oh, I see; then she doesn't understand yet?" said Tant slowly.
"How the devil could I tell her that I was going to provide her with money—and a house—and various comforts? You've no delicacy, Tant. No—I arranged better than that; ostensibly her father is the man who provides the money; he is supposed to have come into a fortune unexpectedly. Now are you satisfied?"
"Perfectly," said Jordan Tant, looking at the floor. "It's all very simple—isn't it?"
Mr. Jordan Tant carried his amazed face out of Arcadia Street, and back to the other end of London; presented it in due course to Mrs. Ewart-Crane and to Enid. Suffering himself to be questioned closely, he refused to speak ill of a friend, but shook his head over that friend nevertheless; and so had the thing gradually screwed out of him.
"I wouldn't have you think for a moment that I'm saying anything against poor old Byfield," said Tant gloomily. "What I do think is that these designing people have got hold of him, and that, to use a vulgar phrase, they will bleed him pretty heavily unless someone steps in. He's mad about the girl; but of course he hasn't reckoned with the family. They'll stick to him like leeches; he'll never be able to shake them off."
"My dear," said Mrs. Ewart-Crane, turning to her daughter a determined face—"I think it is about time that we interfered. Apart from every other consideration, we owe a duty to a friend who, however wrong-headed he may be, is at least a gentleman. I shall most certainly step in, and shall understand once for all, if only for my own satisfaction, what these people intend to do. I dare say a small cottage or at the worst some rooms are to be obtained somewhere in Fiddler's Green; we will go down, and see for ourselves what is happening."
"Personally, mother, I don't think I should interfere," said Enid. "If Gilbert likes to be so silly it's his affair, and it would be somewhat undignified on our part to interfere."
"Undignified or not, I intend to do it," retorted Mrs. Ewart-Crane. "Mr. Tant shall go down and secure a place for us; if I don't have those people out of Gilbert's house in something under a week, I shall be very much surprised!"