nsive one; but I
should certainly say that he knows how to get his own way in most
things. Perhaps you have never come into collision with him?"

Daisy coloured suddenly, and was silent.

Hunt-Goring laughed again. "You see my point, I perceive," he remarked.
"Well, I leave the matter in your hands, but--if you really wish to warn
the girl, I should not warn Nick Ratcliffe first."

He spoke impressively, notwithstanding his laugh. And Daisy accepted his
advice in silence.

Much as she loved Nick, she knew but too well how a struggle with him
would end, and she shrank from risking a conflict. Besides, there was
Olga to be thought of. She resumed her sewing with a puckered brow.
Certainly Olga must be warned.

There might be no truth in the story, but then rumours of that
description never started themselves. And Max Wyndham--well she had been
prejudiced against him from the beginning in spite of the fact that Nick
was all in his favour. He was ruthless and unscrupulous; she was sure of
it. How he had ever managed to win Olga was a perpetual puzzle to her.
Perhaps he really was magnetic, as Nick had said. But she believed it to
be an evil magnetism. As a lover, he was the coolest she had ever seen.

"Altogether objectionable," had been her verdict from the outset.

And now came this monstrous tale to confirm her previous opinion.
Impulsively Daisy decided that Olga must not be left in ignorance.
Marriage was too great a speculation for any risk of that kind to be
justifiable. She felt she owed it to the girl to warn her--to save her
from a possible life-long misery. These things had such a ghastly knack
of turning up afterwards. And Olga was so young, so trusting--

"Are you going to take my advice?" asked Hunt-Goring.

She looked up with a start. "What advice?"

"As to maintaining a discreet silence," he said.

His eyes were half-closed; she could not detect the narrowness of his
scrutiny.

"No," she answered. "I shall certainly speak to Olga. It wouldn't be
right--it wouldn't be fair--not to do so." Her look was suddenly
appealing. "There is a free-masonry among women as well as men," she
said. "We must keep faith with one another at least."

Hunt-Goring closed his eyes completely, and smiled a placid smile. "Dear
Mrs. Musgrave," he said, "you are a true woman."

And she did not hear the note of exultation below the lazy appreciation
of his words.

CHAPTER XV

THE SPREADING OF THE FLAME

Ce