"Surely," said Anthony Trent. "As it happens I met a man out there who knew him well and said he was a good soldier."
"I wish my father could know that," she said. "I'm going to ask you to luncheon tomorrow and to meet a man whose life Arthur saved would cheer him enormously. We shall be alone." She frowned. "I'd forgotten Mr. Castoon who is probably furious at being kept waiting. I promised him I'd be back in two cigarettes time. I was going to drive in to Camelford but I don't think I will. I feel almost that I want to cry." She held out her hand impulsively. "Forgive me for what I thought about you and come to luncheon at one tomorrow."
"You don't know how I'd like to," he said wistfully, "but you have forgotten about my past; and I had no such excuse as your brother."
"You are exaggerating it," she said more brightly. "Anyhow it's all over."
Exaggerating! And even were it all over, which he doubted, a blacker past remained than ever she dreamed of.
"I don't want Mr. Castoon to see that I've got tears in my eyes. Please tell him to wait a little longer while I talk to Mrs. Bassett. Au revoir."
Anthony Trent watched her go and then sighed. And he told himself that had he met her ten years before he would have had the strength to win a fortune honestly and not take the lower road.
He went outside to where Rudolph Castoon was sitting in the phaeton. The two horses were champing at their bits, a little groom at their heads trying to soothe their high tempers. He approached the financier with no personal feeling of any sort. In the beginning he expected to admire the man as he did all such forceful characters. He often suspected there was more kinship between him and the ruthless financier type that Castoon represented than the world comprehended.
Rudolph Castoon looked at him sourly.
"Well?" he snapped.