s future is at
stake. You say it was all idle gossip. I find that hard to believe. Even
if so, I must have that gossip investigated and proved to be nothing but
gossip."

"Investigate it then," said the Imp peevishly.

"You refuse me the materials. What you told Major Duplay was too vague.
You know more. You can put me on the track."

Mina was silent. Neeld wiped his brow with his handkerchief. Iver
changed his tone.

"Mina, we've been friends to you. I'm not ashamed to remind you of it.
Janie's a great friend of yours; my wife and I have welcomed you first
for her sake, then for your own. Is this the best return you can make
us? Consult anybody you like, if you think I'm prejudiced, whether your
conduct is honorable, is square." He paused a moment. "Ask Mr Neeld here
what he would do. I'm willing to abide by his judgment."

Mina was sorely tempted to say, "Ask him then." The situation would thus
become so much the more piquant. But Mr Neeld was in such distress--to
her sharp eyes a distress so visible--that she did not dare to risk the
_coup_. If he were let alone he might keep silence and quiet his
conscience by the plea that he had been asked no questions. But she did
not venture to face him with a demand for a verdict on her conduct; for
her conduct was also his own.

"I must judge for myself. Mr Neeld can't help me," she answered. "Uncle
has chosen to say he can prove these things. Let him try." She drew
herself up with a prim prudish air. "I don't think it's desirable to mix
myself up in such very peculiar questions at all, and I don't think it's
nice of men to come and cross-question me about them."

"Oh, we're not in a girls' school," said Iver, with a touch of
irritation hardly suppressed. "We come as men of the world to a sensible
woman."

"Anybody will tell you I'm not that," interrupted the Imp.

"Well, then, to a woman of good feeling, who wishes to be honest and to
be true to her friends. Duplay, have you no influence with Madame
Zabriska?"

"I've spared no effort," replied the Major. "I can't believe that she
won't help us in the end." His tone was almost menacing. Mina,
remembering how he had terrorized the secret out of her before, and
resenting the humiliation of the memory, stiffened her neck once more.

"I've nothing to say. You must do as you think best," she said.

"You must be made to speak."

Iver's threats alarmed where Duplay's only annoyed. He spoke calmly and
with weight.