“But you wouldn’t ask your maid to tea, would you?” said Constance, gently amused.

“I might, if I could afford to,” she nodded listlessly.  “I believe that girl could do it without disturbing her Own self-respect or losing caste below stairs or above.  As for the Van Dieman—­just common cat, Constance.”

Miss Palliser laughed.  “Shiela Cardross refused the Van Dieman son and heir—­if you think that might be an explanation of the cattishness.”

“Really?” asked Virginia, without interest.  “Where did you hear that gossip?”

“From our vixenish tabby herself.  The thin and vindictive are usually without a real sense of humour.  I rather suspected young Jan Van Dieman’s discomfiture.  He left, you know, just after Garret arrived,” she added demurely.

Virginia raised her eyes at the complacent inference; but even curiosity seemed to have died out in her, and she only said, languidly: 

“You think she cares for Garret?  And you approve?”

“I think I’d approve if she did.  Does that astonish you?”

“Not very much.”

Virginia seemed to have lost all spirit.  She laughed rarely, nowadays.  She was paler, too, than usual—­paler than was ornamental; and pallor suited her rather fragile features, too.  Also she had become curiously considerate of other people’s feelings—­rather subdued; less ready in her criticisms; gentler in judgments.  All of which symptoms Constance had already noted with incredulity and alarm.

“Where did you and Louis Malcourt go this afternoon?” she asked, unpegging her hair.

“Out to the beach.  There was nothing there except sky and water, and a filthy eagle dining on a dead fish.”

Miss Palliser waited, sitting before her dresser; but as Virginia offered no further information she shook out the splendid masses of her chestnut hair and, leaning forward, examined her features in the mirror with minute attention.

“It’s strange,” she murmured, half to herself, “how ill Jim Wayward has been looking recently.  I can’t account for it.”

“I can, dear,” said Virginia gently.

Constance turned in surprise.

“How?”

“Mr. Malcourt says that he is practising self-denial.  It hurts, you know.”

“What!” exclaimed Constance, flushing up.

“I said that it hurts.”

“Such a slur as that harms Louis Malcourt—­not Mr. Wayward!” returned Constance hotly.

Virginia repeated:  “It hurts—­to kill desire.  It hurts even before habit is acquired ... they say.  Louis Malcourt says so.  And if that is true—­can you wonder that poor Mr. Wayward looks like death?  I speak in all sympathy and kindness—­as did Mr. Malcourt.”

So that was it!  Constance stared at her own fair face in the mirror, and deep into the pained brown eyes reflected there.  The eyes suddenly dimmed and the parted mouth quivered.

So that was the dreadful trouble!—­the explanation of the recent change in him—­the deep lines of pain from the wing of the pinched nostril—­the haunted gaze, the long, restless silences, the forced humour and its bitter flavour tainting voice and word!