ruth. Who was your informant?"

"Mr. Bower."

"None other?"

"What, then? Is my pitiful story the property of the hotel?"

"It is now. I took care of that. Some of the people there had been
spreading a misleading version, and it was necessary to correct it.
The women, of course, I could not deal with. As the General was an old
man, I picked out George de Courcy Vavasour as best fitted to digest
the wrong edition. I made him eat it. It seemed to disagree with him;
but he got through with an effort."

Helen felt that she ought to decline further discussion. But she was
tongue tied. Spencer was regarding her so fixedly that she began to
fear lest he might notice the embarrassed perplexity that she herself
was quite conscious of.

"Will you be good enough to explain exactly what you mean?" she said,
forcing the question mechanically from her lips.

"That is why I am here. I assure you that subterfuge can never again
exist between you and me," said he earnestly. "You can accept my words
literally. Acting for himself and others, Vavasour wrote on paper the
lying insinuations made by Miss Jaques, and ate them--both words and
paper. He happened to use the thin, glazed, Continental variety, so
what it lost in bulk it gained in toughness. He didn't like it, and
said so; but he had to do it."

She was nervously aware of a wish to laugh; but unless she gave way to
hysteria that was not to be thought of. Trying to retreat still
farther into the friendly shade, she backed round the inner end of the
table, but found the way blocked by a rough bench. Something must be
said or done to extricate herself. The dread that her voice might
break was becoming an obsession.

"You speak of a false version, and that implies a true one," she
managed to say constrainedly. "How far was Mr. Bower's statement false
or true?"

"I settled that point too. Mr. Bower told you the facts. The deduction
he forced on you was a lie. To my harmless notion of gratifying a
girl's longing for a holiday abroad he added the motive that inspired
his own journey. I overheard your conversation with Miss Jaques in the
Embankment Hotel; I saw Bower introduced to you; I saw him looking for
you in Victoria Station, and knew that he represented the meeting as
accidental. I felt a certain responsibility on your account; so I
followed by the next train. Bower played his cards so well that I
found myself in a difficult position. I was busy guessing; but was
unable