hristopher spoke.

"I thought that was all quite gone, Patricia."

"So did I," she returned wearily. "It's ages since I was so stupid.
It's generally all right if you are there."

"But I'm not always there anyhow."

"I don't mean there really. I just shut my eyes and pretend you are
and hold on. But just now I waited for you to do something. I forgot
you were driving."

"You mustn't rely on me to stop you now," he insisted, with new
gravity.

"Oh, yes, I do. It's always you if I stop in time; either you
actually, or thinking of you. Don't talk about it, Christopher dear,
it was too horrible."

She did not explain if she meant the danger or the cause, but he
obeyed and said no more. A terrible fear clamoured at his heart. Did
Geoffry Leverson know or did he not? and if he knew, would he even
understand? He tried to tell himself that if he could manage her, then
another, and that her acknowledged lover, could do so too, but he knew
this was false reasoning. Such power as he had over her lay in his
recognition that the irresistible inheritance was not an integral part
of Patricia, but was an exotic growth, foisted upon her by the
ill-understood laws of paternity, and finding no natural soil in her
pure self--something indeed, of a lower nature, that she must and
could override. He could have curbed it in the brief flash just over,
he knew, had his attention been free. It had died as it had come and
the penalty of the crushed fingers hurt him as unwarrantable, combined
with the peril they had run.

It was a fresh addition of cloud to the dimmed day to find Peter
Masters had not departed, but was staying the night.

CHAPTER XX

Aymer gazed out of the open window at Christopher and Peter Masters as
they walked to and fro on the terrace. He knew the subject they were
discussing, and he was already sure how it would end. But what were
the real issues involved he could not determine, and he was impotent,
by reason of his vow and will, to influence them. He could only lie
still and watch, tortured by jealous fear and the physical
helplessness that forbade him the one relief of movement for which his
soul craved. The patience the long years had schooled him into was
slipping away, and the elementary forces of his nature reigned in its
stead.

Under the overmastering impulse towards action he made a futile effort
to sit up that he might better follow the movements of the two
outside. It was a pathetic failur