Miserably uncomfortable, utterly unable to comprehend, the girl rode on in silence, her ears ringing with Rosamund’s words.  And Rosamund, riding beside her, cool, blond, and cynically amused, continued the theme with admirable pretence of indifference: 

“It’s a pity that ill-natured people are for ever discussing them; and it makes me indignant, because I’ve always been very fond of Alixe Ruthven, and I am positive that she does not correspond with Captain Selwyn.  A girl in her position would be crazy to invite suspicion by doing the things they say she is doing—­”

“Don’t, Mrs. Fane, please, don’t!” stammered Eileen; “I—­I really can’t listen.  I simply will not!” Then bewildered, hurt, and blindly confused as she was, the instinct to defend flashed up—­though from what she was defending him she did not realise:  “It is utterly untrue!” she exclaimed hotly—­“all that yo—­all that they say!—­whoever they are—­whatever they mean.  I cannot understand it—­I don’t understand, and I will not!  Nor will he!” she added with a scornful conviction that disconcerted Rosamund; “for if you knew him as I do, Mrs. Fane, you would never, never have spoken as you have.”

Mrs. Fane relished neither the naive rebuke nor the intimation that her own acquaintance with Selwyn was so limited; and least of all did she relish the implied intimacy between this red-haired young girl and Captain Selwyn.

“Dear Miss Erroll,” she said blandly, “I spoke as I did only to assure you that I, also, disregard such malicious gossip—­”

“But if you disregard it, Mrs. Fane, why do you repeat it?”

“Merely to emphasise to you my disbelief in it, child,” returned Rosamund.  “Do you understand?”

“Y-es; thank you.  Yet, I should never have heard of it at all if you had not told me.”

Rosamund’s colour rose one degree: 

“It is better to hear such things from a friend, is it not?”

“I didn’t know that one’s friends said such things; but perhaps it is better that way, as you say, only, I cannot understand the necessity of my knowing—­of my hearing—­because it is Captain Selwyn’s affair, after all.”

“And that,” said Rosamund deliberately, “is why I told you.”

“Told me?  Oh—­because he and I are such close friends?”

“Yes—­such very close friends that I”—­she laughed—­“I am informed that your interests are soon to be identical.”

The girl swung round, self-possessed, but dreadfully pale.

“If you believed that,” she said, “it was vile of you to say what you said, Mrs. Fane.”

“But I did not believe it, child!” stammered Rosamund, several degrees redder than became her, and now convinced that it was true.  “I n-never dreamed of offending you, Miss Erroll—­”

“Do you suppose I am too ignorant to take offence?” said the girl unsteadily.  “I told you very plainly that I did not understand the matters you chose for discussion; but I do understand impertinence when I am driven to it.”