ed the views of the governess person, very jealous of any
outside influence. But in any case it would not have been an easy
matter. Extraordinary, stiff-backed, thin figure all fin black, the
observed of all, while walking hand-in-hand with the girl; apparently
shy, but--and here Fyne came very near showing something like insight--
probably nursing under a diffident manner a considerable amount of
secret arrogance. Mrs Fyne pitied Flora de Barral's fate long before
the catastrophe. Most unfortunate guidance. Very unsatisfactory
surroundings. The girl was known in the streets, was stared at in
public places as if she had been a sort of princess, but she was kept
with a very ominous consistency, from making any acquaintances--though
of course there were many people no doubt who would have been more than
willing to--h'm--make themselves agreeable to Miss de Barral. But this
did not enter into the plans of the governess, an intriguing person
hatching a most sinister plot under her severe air of distant,
fashionable exclusiveness. Good little Fyne's eyes bulged with solemn
horror as he revealed to me, in agitated speech, his wife's more than
suspicions, at the time, of that, Mrs--Mrs What's her name's
perfidious conduct. She actually seemed to have--Mrs Fyne asserted--
formed a plot already to marry eventually her charge to an impecunious
relation of her own--a young man with furtive eyes and something
impudent in his manner, whom that woman called her nephew, and whom she
was always having down to stay with her.

"And perhaps not her nephew. No relation at all"--Fyne emitted with a
convulsive effort this, the most awful part of the suspicions Mrs Fyne
used to impart to him piecemeal when he came down to spend his weekends
gravely with her and the children. The Fynes, in their good-natured
concern for the unlucky child of the man busied in stirring casually so
many millions, spent the moments of their weekly reunion in wondering
earnestly what could be done to defeat the most wicked of conspiracies,
trying to invent some tactful line of conduct in such extraordinary
circumstances. I could see them, simple, and scrupulous, worrying
honestly about that unprotected big girl while looking at their own
little girls playing on the sea-shore. Fyne assured me that his wife's
rest was disturbed by the great problem of interference.

"It was very acute of Mrs Fyne to spot such a deep game," I said,
wondering to myself wh