All the details of that famous scandal began to come back to him.  His companion, her history, her relations to others, to himself, began to appear to him in the most astonishing new lights.  So, instead of the mere humble outsider, she belonged all the time to the best English blood?  The society in which he had met her was full of her kindred.  No doubt the Duchess knew—­and Montresor....  He was meshed in a net of thoughts perplexing and confounding, of which the total result was perhaps that she appeared to him as she sat there, the slender outline so quiet and still, more attractive and more desirable than ever.  The mystery surrounding her in some way glorified her, and he dimly perceived that so it must have been for others.

“How did you ever bear the Bruton Street life?” he said, presently, in a low voice of wonder.  “Lady Henry knew?”

“Oh yes!”

“And the Duchess?”

“Yes.  She is a connection of my mother’s.”

Warkworth’s mind went back to the Moffatts.  A flush spread slowly over the face of the young officer.  It was indeed an extraordinary imbroglio in which he found himself.

“How did Lord Lackington take it?” he asked, after a pause.

“He was, of course, much startled, much moved.  We had a long talk.  Everything is to remain just the same.  He wishes to make me an allowance, and, if he persists, I suppose I can’t hurt him by refusing.  But for the present I have refused.  It is more amusing to earn one’s own living.”  She turned to him with a sharp brightness in her black eyes.  “Besides, if Lord Lackington gives me money, he will want to give me advice.  And I would rather advise myself.”

Warkworth sat silent a moment.  Then he took a great resolve.

“I want to speak to you,” he said, suddenly, putting out his hand to hers, which lay on her knee.

She turned to him, startled.

“I want to have no secrets from you,” he said, drawing his breath quickly.  “I told you lies one day, because I thought it was my duty to tell lies.  Another person was concerned.  But now I can’t.  Julie!—­you’ll let me call you so, won’t you?  The name is already”—­he hesitated; then the words rushed out—­“part of my life!  Julie, it’s quite true, there is a kind of understanding between your little cousin Aileen and me.  At Simla she attracted me enormously.  I lost my head one day in the woods, when she—­whom we were all courting—­distinguished me above two or three other men who were there.  I proposed to her upon a sudden impulse, and she accepted me.  She is a charming, soft creature.  Perhaps I wasn’t justified.  Perhaps she ought to have had more chance of seeing the world.  Anyway, there was a great row.  Her guardians insisted that I had behaved badly.  They could not know all the details of the matter, and I was not going to tell them.  Finally I promised to withdraw for two years.”

He paused, anxiously studying her face.  It had grown very white, and, he thought, very cold.  But she quickly rose, and, looking down upon him, said: