Connie flushed darker with rage, at the suggestion. Yet, while her passion was on her, she could not lie. She could not even pretend there was nothing between herself and the keeper. She looked at the other woman, who stood so sly, with her head dropped: yet somehow, in her femaleness, an ally.

“Oh well!” she said. “If it is so, it is so. I don’t mind!”

“Why, you’re all right, my Lady! You’ve only been sheltering in the hut. It’s absolutely nothing.”

They went on to the house. Connie marched in to Clifford’s room, furious with him, furious with his pale, overwrought face and prominent eyes.

“I must say, I don’t think you need send the servants after me!” she burst out.