He was not himself. Of that she was convinced. To her, ever since her father’s death, he had been a good friend, and for a year prior to her engagement at Cunnington’s he had divided his salary with her. No girl ever had a better brother than he had been, yet of late she had noticed a complete change in his manner. He was no longer frank with her, as he used to be, and he seemed often to hide from her facts which, with her woman’s keen intelligence, she afterwards discovered.
“Miss Rolfe!” exclaimed Mr Warner, emerging from his office. “Disengaged?” And he pointed to a pair of somewhat obese ladies who were examining a costume displayed on a stand.
“Well, good-bye, Charlie,” she said, shaking his hand. “I must go. We’re very busy this afternoon. Perhaps I shall see you at Charing Cross. If not—then take care of yourself, dear. Good-bye.”
And she turned and left him to attend to the two ladies, while he, with a nod across to Mr Warner, strode out of the shop.
“I hope to goodness Marion doesn’t come,” he muttered to himself. “Women are so infernally inquisitive. And if she does go to Charing Cross she’s sure to suspect something!”
Chapter Two.
Concerns a Silent Secret.
That same afternoon, while Charlie Rolfe was bidding farewell to his sister Marion, Max Barclay was sitting in the cosy study of one of the smaller houses in Cromwell Road, smoking cigarettes with a thin-faced, grey-haired, grey-bearded man whose cast of features at once betrayed him to be a foreigner.