know, Bessie? Why don't you ask Archie?"

"I have asked him. I've just come from there. I can't make out anything
he says. He's been trying to tell me that we've spent it--when I know we
haven't spent it."

There were tears in Ena's voice as she said: "Well, I can't explain it,
Bessie. _I_ don't know anything about business."

From where he stood, with his hand on the knob, as he closed the door
behind him, Thor could see into the huge, old-fashioned, gilt-framed
mirror over the chimney-piece in the drawing-room. The two women were
standing, separated by a small table which supported an azalea in bloom.
His stepmother, in a soft, trailing house-gown, her hands behind her
back, seemed taller and slenderer than ever in contrast to Mrs.
Willoughby's dumpiness, dwarfed as it was by an enormous muff and
encumbering furs.

The latter drew herself up indignantly. Her tone changed. "You do know
something about business, Ena. You knew enough about it to drag Len and
me into what we never would have thought of doing, if you and Archie
hadn't--"

"I? Why, Bessie, you must be crazy."

"I'm not crazy; though God knows it's enough to make me so. I remember
everything as if it had happened this afternoon."

There was a faint scintillation in the diamonds in Ena's brooch and
ear-rings as she tossed her head. "If you do that you must recall that I
was afraid of it from the first."

Bessie was quick to detect the admission. "Why?" she demanded. "If you
were afraid of it, _why_ were you afraid? You weren't afraid without
seeing something to be afraid of."

Mrs. Masterman nearly wept. "I don't know anything about business at
all, Bessie."

"Oh, don't tell me that," Bessie broke in, fiercely. "You knew enough
about it to see that Archie wanted our money in 1892."

"But _I_ hadn't anything to do with it."

"Hadn't anything to do with it? Then who had? Who was it suggested to me
that Len should go into business?--one evening?--in the Hotel de
Marsan?--after dinner? Who was that?"

"If I said anything at all it was that I hated business and everything
that had to do with it."

"Oh, I can understand that well enough," Bessie exclaimed, scornfully.
"You hated it because you saw already that your husband was going to
ruin us. Come now, Ena! Didn't you?"

Mrs. Masterman protested tearfully. "I didn't know anything about it. I
only wished that Archie would let you and your money alone--and I wish
it still."

"Very well, then!"