rather set against me, I
know; but try and forget all about that. Things are changed. After all,
you know, I'm one of the men that people talk about; my name has got
into the "directories of talent", as somebody calls them; and I have a
good deal at stake. It won't do for me to go fooling about any more.
All I mean is, that you can trust me, down to the ground. And there's
nobody I would be better pleased to help in a friendly way than you,
Mrs. Rolfe.'

Alma was gazing at him in surprise, mingled with apprehension.

'Please say what you mean. I don't see how you can possibly do me any
service. I have given up all thought of a professional career.

'I know you have. I'm sorry for it, but it isn't that I want to talk
about. You don't see Mrs. Carnaby, but I suppose you hear of her now
and then?'

'Very rarely.'

'You know that she has been taken up by Lady Isobel Barker?'

'Who is Lady Isobel Barker?'

'Why, she's a daughter of the Earl of Bournemouth, and she married a
fellow on the Stock Exchange. There are all sorts of amusing stories
about her. I don't mean anything shady--just the opposite. She did a
good deal of slumming at the time when it was fashionable, and started
a home for women of a certain kind--all that sort of thing. Barker is
by way of being a millionaire, and they live in great style; have
Royalties down at Boscombe, and so on. Well, Mrs. Carnaby has got hold
of her. I don't know how she managed it. Just after that affair it
looked as if she would have a bad time. People cut her--you know all
about that?'

'No, I don't. You mean that they thought----'

'Just so; they did think.' He nodded and smiled. 'She was all the talk
at the clubs, and, no doubt, in the boudoirs. I wasn't a friend of
hers, you know--I met her now and then, that was all; so I didn't quite
know what to think. But it looked--_didn't_ it?'

Alma avoided his glance, and said nothing.

'I shouldn't wonder,' pursued Dymes, 'if she went to Lady Isobel and
talked about her hard case, and just asked for help. At all events,
last May we began to hear of Mrs. Carnaby again. Women who wanted to be
thought smart had quite altered their tone about her. Men laughed, but
some of them began to admit that the case was doubtful. At all events,
Lady Isobel was on her side, and that meant a good deal.'

'And she went about in society just as if nothing had happened?'

'No, no. That would have been bad taste, considering where her husband