“Oh, you crafty Lionel!  To save you the trouble of presiding.  Thank you,” she continued good-humouredly, “I am more comfortable here.  What is this story about a ghost?  The kitchen’s in a regular commotion, Benoite says.”

“To what do you allude?” asked Lionel.

“Dan Duff is dying, or dead,” returned Sibylla.  “Benoite was in Deerham last night, and brought him home to carry her parcels.  In going back again, he saw, as he says, Rachel Frost’s ghost, and it terrified him out of his senses.  Old Roy saw it too, and the news has travelled up here.”

Sibylla laughed as she spoke.  Lionel looked vexed.

“They are very stupid,” he said.  “A pity but they kept such stories to themselves.  If they were only as quiet as poor Rachel’s ghost is, it might be better for some of them.”

“Of course you would wish it kept quiet,” said Sibylla, in a tone full of significance.  “I like to hear of these frights—­it is good fun.”

He did not fathom in the remotest degree the meaning of her tone.  But he had not gone thither to dispute about ghosts.

“Sibylla,” he gravely said, putting the open account into her hand, “I have received this bill this morning.”

Sibylla ran her eyes over it with indifference; first at the bill’s head, to see whence it came, next at its sum total.

“What an old cheat!  Eleven hundred pounds!  I am sure I have not had the half.”

Lionel pointed to the part “bill delivered.”  “Was that not paid in the spring?”

“How can I recollect?” returned Sibylla, speaking as carelessly as before.

“I think you may recollect if you try.  I gave you a cheque for the amount.”

“Oh, yes, I do recollect now.  It has not been paid.”

“But, my dear, I say I gave the cheque for it.”

“I cashed the cheque myself.  I wanted some money just then.  You can’t think how fast money goes in London, Lionel.”

The avowal proved only what he suspected.  Nevertheless it hurt him greatly—­grieved him to his heart’s core.  Not so much the spending of the money, as the keeping the fact from him.  What a lack of good feeling, of confidence, it proved.

He bent towards her, speaking gently, kindly.  Whatever might be her faults to him, her provocations, he could never behave otherwise to her than as a thorough gentleman, a kind husband.

“It was not right to use that cheque, Sibylla.  It was made out in Madame Lebeau’s name, and should have been paid to her.  But why did you not tell me?”

Sibylla shrugged her shoulders in place of answer.  She had picked up many such little national habits of Mademoiselle Benoite’s.  Very conspicuous just then was the upright line on Lionel’s brow.

“The amount altogether is, you perceive, eleven hundred pounds,” he continued.

“Yes,” said Sibylla.  “She’s a cheat, that Madame Lebeau.  I shall make Benoite write her a French letter, and tell her so.”