"Wattie takes to you," she says, looking at him; "though he never liked strangers."
The change in her voice brings me back to common-places. "Is that his name? I am going now. Good-bye."
She stretches out her slim hand, and lays it in mine; a queer sensation runs through me as I look down at it—the band that worked my life's misery so deftly and well.
"You have promised," she says, "do not forget. You have promised to come here sometimes and see me and Wattie."
"I shall not forget."
She closes her eyes, and as we pass out of the room, I pause to look at her, thinking that she looks far more like a dead woman than a living one. In the corridor outside several servants are standing.
"That's Miss Adair," says one of them in a very low voice, as I pass, "her as master's so sweet on."
Have we any secrets from the detectives who eat our salt, take our wages, and do our bidding? Wattie trots along by my side, the nurse follows, at the foot of the stairs we meet Paul Vasher.
CHAPTER X.
"God protect me from the man I trust, I will protect myself from him whom, I trust not."
Time, four o'clock. Scene, a level sweep of velvet-smooth lawn before The Towers, upon which are pacing up and down and sitting about some sixty or seventy men and women of every size, make, age, and appearance, and among them in festive raiment, like unto the rest, are—oh, wonder of wonders!—Dolly and I, sitting one on either side of Mrs. Skipworth. That lady, as a delicate compliment to the devouring heat of the day, wears a
