For days Grover kept seeing the face of the Sophie he had known, the Sophie to whom he had read poems and talked amateur philosophy; the Sophie redolent of a sweet scent that baffled description; the Sophie he had loved and trusted and in the wonderment of awakening passion kissed. His instinctive antipathy toward Peñaverde and the resurrected pain had created an instantaneous desire to rescue her name from those lips, a desire to deny the possibility of this opportunist's easy assumption of rights in his own Sophie. For this man would no more have scrupled to abuse Sophie's confidence than he would, had there been enough to gain by it, have scrupled to make a wicked caricature of Floss. The unkind studies of those poor, defenceless old souls in his studio were evidence enough of his lack of conscience, if tangible evidence were needed.
Worst of all a doubt, never quite formulated in the past, kept growing in his mind. After the disastrous conclusion of his comradeship with Sophie something had retrospectively squinted a little, and he had idly wondered, vaguely suspected. And now this Armando—oh, Sophie, since it had to be unearthed, why should it have had to be this man, with his cold, glittering intensity, and his sinister after-glances! Et tu, Sophie, he said, like Caesar, were you a member of that worldwide league of people who play with cards up their sleeves! Which pillar next!
There was no doubting the truth of the Spaniard's
