“The darling!” whispered Mrs. Carrick; “look at that brier mark across her wrist!—­our poor little worn-out colleen!”

“She was not too far gone to mention Garret Hamil,” observed Cecile.

Mrs. Cardross looked silently at Cecile, then at the girl on the bed who had called her mother.  After a moment she bent with difficulty and kissed the brier-torn wrist, wondering perhaps whether by chance a deeper wound lay hidden beneath the lace-veiled, childish breast.

“Little daughter—­little daughter!” she murmured close to the small unheeding ear.  Cecile waited, a smile half tender, half amused curving her parted lips; then she glanced curiously at Mrs. Carrick.  But that young matron, ignoring the enfant terrible, calmly tucked her arm under her mother’s; Cecile, immersed in speculative thought, followed them from the room; a maid extinguished the lights.

In an hour the Villa Cardross was silent and dark, save that, in the moonlight which struck through the panes of Malcourt’s room, an unquiet shadow moved from window to window, looking out into the mystery of night.

* * * * *

The late morning sun flung a golden net across Malcourt’s bed; he lay asleep, dark hair in handsome disorder, dark eyes sealed—­too young to wear that bruised, loose mask so soon with the swollen shadows under lid and lip.  Yet, in his unconscious features there was now a certain simplicity almost engaging, which awake, he seemed to lack; as though latent somewhere within him were qualities which chance might germinate into nobler growth.  But chance, alone, is a poor gardener.

Hamil passing the corridor as the valet, carrying a tray, opened Malcourt’s door, glanced in at him; and Malcourt awoke at the same moment, and sat bolt upright.

“Hello, Hamil!” he nodded sleepily, “come in, old fellow!” And, to the valet:  “No breakfast for me, thank you—­except grape-fruit!—­unless you’ve brought me a cuckootail?  Yes?  No?  Stung!  Never mind; just hand me a cigarette and take away the tray.  It’s a case of being a very naughty boy, Hamil.  How are you anyway, and what did you shoot?”

Hamil greeted him briefly, but did not seem inclined to enter or converse.

Malcourt yawned, glanced at the grape-fruit, then affably at Hamil.

“I say,” he began, “hope you’ll overlook my rotten behaviour last time we met.  I’d been dining at random, and I’m usually a brute when I do that.”

“Oh, it’s all right,” said Hamil, looking at the row of tiny Chinese idols on the mantel.

“No rancour?”

“No.  Only—­why do you do it, Malcourt?”

“Why do I do which?  The wheel or the lady?”

“Oh, the whole bally business?  It isn’t as if you were lonely and put to it.  There are plenty of attractive girls about, and anybody will take you on at Bridge.  Of course it’s none of my affair—­but we came unpleasantly close to a quarrel—­which is my only excuse.”