'You're an old woman, Emily, and there's no fool like an old
fool.  The man's twenty years younger than you, and don't you
fool yourself as to what he married you for.  Money! Well, don't
let him have too much of it.  Farmer Raikes has got a very pretty
young wife.  Just ask your Alfred how much time he spends over
there.' She was very angry.  Natural! I went on, 'I'm going to
warn you, whether you like it or not.  That man would as soon
murder you in your bed as look at you.  He's a bad lot.  You can
say what you like to me, but remember what I've told you.  He's a
bad lot!' "

"What did she say?"

Miss Howard made an extremely expressive grimace.

" 'Darling Alfred'--'dearest Alfred'--'wicked calumnies'
--'wicked lies'--'wicked woman'--to accuse her 'dear husband'!
The sooner I left her house the better.  So I'm off."

"But not now?"

"This minute!"

For a moment we sat and stared at her.  Finally John Cavendish,
finding his persuasions of no avail, went off to look up the
trains.  His wife followed him, murmuring something about
persuading Mrs. Inglethorp to think better of it.

As she left the room, Miss Howard's face changed.  She leant
towards me eagerly.

"Mr. Hastings, you're honest.  I can trust you?"

I was a little startled.  She laid her hand on my arm, and sank
her voice to a whisper.

"Look after her, Mr. Hastings.  My poor Emily.  They're a lot of
sharks--all of them.  Oh, I know what I'm talking about.  There
isn't one of them that's not hard up and trying to get money out
of her.  I've protected her as much as I could.  Now I'm out of
the way, they'll impose upon her."

"Of course, Miss Howard," I said, "I'll do everything I can, but
I'm sure you're excited and overwrought."

She interrupted me by slowly shaking her forefinger.

"Young man, trust me.  I've lived in the world rather longer than
you have.  All I ask you is to keep your eyes open.  You'll see
what I mean."

The throb of the motor came through the open window, and Miss
Howard rose and moved to the door.  John's voice sounded outside.
With her hand on the handle, she turned her head over her
shoulder, and beckoned to me.

"Above all, Mr. Hastings, watch that devil--her husband!"

There was no time for more.  Miss Howard was swallowed up in an
eager chorus of protests and good-byes.  The Inglethorps did not
appear.

As the motor drove away, Mrs. Cavendish suddenly detached herself
from the group, and moved across the drive to the lawn to meet a
tall bearded man who had been evidently making for the house.
The colour rose in her cheeks as she held out her hand to him.

"Who is that?" I asked sharply, for instinctively I distrusted
the man.

"That's Dr. Bauerstein," said John shortly.

"And who is Dr. Bauerstein?"

"He's staying in the village doing a rest cure, after a bad
nervous breakdown.  He's a London specialist; a very clever
man--one of the greatest living experts on poisons, I believe."

"And he's a great friend of Mary's," put in Cynthia, the
irrepressible.

John Cavendish frowned and changed the subject.

"Come for a stroll, Hastings.  This has been a most rotten
business.  She always had a rough tongue, but there is no
stauncher friend in England than Evelyn Howard."

He took the path through the plantation, and we walked down to
the village through the woods which bordered one side of the
estate.

As we passed through one of the gates on our way home again, a
pretty young woman of gipsy type coming in the opposite direction
bowed and smiled.

"That's a pretty girl," I remarked appreciatively.

John's face hardened.

"That is Mrs. Raikes."