‘I wanted to see you alone. I could not get near you on account of that infernal old woman.’ Stephen’s face grew hard.

‘On account of whom?’ she asked with dangerous politeness.

‘Miss Rowly; your aunt.’

‘Don’t you think, Mr. Everard,’ she said icily, ‘that it is at least an unpardonable rudeness to speak that way, and to me, of the woman I love best in all the world?’

‘Sorry!’ he said in the offhand way of younger days, ‘I apologise. Fact is, I was angry that she wouldn’t let me see you.’

‘Not let you see me!’ she said as if amazed. ‘What do mean?’