When back again once more in Yorkshire, I was delighted to find that Lola had returned from her visit to Devonshire. She was just as sweet and charming as ever, but just a trifle too inquisitive regarding my visits to Eastbourne and Paris. I was much ashamed of the theft I had been forced to commit in order to preserve secrecy regarding my first downfall, hence rather awkwardly, I fear, I evaded all her questions.
Nevertheless, we were a great deal in each other’s company, and had many confidential chats. I loved her, yet somehow I could not be frank and open. How could I without revealing the secret of her father?
One spring afternoon we had been playing tennis and were sitting together in the pretty arbor at the end of the well-kept lawn, both smoking cigarettes after a strenuous game, when suddenly she turned to me, saying:
“Do you know, Mr. Hargreave, I don’t like the look of things at all! Mr. Duperré is not playing a straight game—of that I’m sure!”
“Oh—why?” I asked with affected ignorance.
“I have again overheard something. Yesterday I was just going into the morning-room, the door of which stood ajar, when I heard father warning Duperré of something—I couldn’t quite catch what it was. Only he said that he didn’t approve of such drastic measures, and that ‘the old man might lose his life.’ To that Duperré replied: ‘And if he did, nobody would be any wiser.’ What can it mean?”
“I fear I am just as ignorant as yourself,” I replied, looking the arch-crook’s pretty daughter full in the face.
“Well,” she said, “I know I can trust you, Mr. Hargreave. I have only you in whom I can confide.”
“Yes,” I assured her, bending across to her. “You can trust me implicitly. I, too, am just as puzzled as yourself.”