First, naturally enough, he meant to make
it his business to protect Beatrice from the pressure of poverty, and
well knew that it would be useless to offer her direct assistance.
Secondly, he wished to show Elizabeth that it would not be to the
advantage of her family to quarrel with him. If she _had_ seen a ghost,
perhaps this fact would make her reticent on the subject. He did not
know that she was playing a much bigger game for her own hand, a game
of which the stakes were thousands a year, and that she was moreover mad
with jealousy and what, in such a woman, must pass for love.

Elizabeth made no comment on his offer, and before Mr. Granger's profuse
thanks were nearly finished, Geoffrey was gone.

Three weeks passed at Bryngelly, and Elizabeth still held her hand.
Beatrice, pale and spiritless, went about her duties as usual. Elizabeth
never spoke to her in any sense that could awaken her suspicions, and
the ghost story was, or appeared to be, pretty well forgotten. But at
last an event occurred that caused Elizabeth to take the field. One day
she met Owen Davies walking along the beach in the semi-insane way which
he now affected. He stopped, and, without further ado, plunged into
conversation.

"I can't bear it any longer," he said wildly, throwing up his arms. "I
saw her yesterday, and she cut me short before I could speak a word. I
have prayed for patience and it will not come, only a Voice seemed
to say to me that I must wait ten days more, ten short days, and then
Beatrice, my beautiful Beatrice, would be my wife at last."

"If you go on in this way, Mr. Davies," said Elizabeth sharply, her
heart filled with jealous anger, "you will soon be off your head. Are
you not ashamed of yourself for making such a fuss about a girl's pretty
face? If you want to get married, marry somebody else."

"Marry somebody else," he said dreamily; "I don't know anybody else whom
I could marry except you, and you are not Beatrice."

"No," answered Elizabeth angrily, "I should hope that I have more
sense, and if you wanted to marry me you would have to set about it in
a different way from this. I am not Beatrice, thank Heaven, but I am
her sister, and I warn you that I know more about her than you do. As a
friend I warn you to be careful. Supposing that Beatrice were not worthy
of you, you would not wish to marry her, would you?"

Now Owen Davies was at heart somewhat afraid of Elizabeth, like most
other people who had