Melrose received these various items of information half scornfully, half
greedily; it might have been guessed that his interest in the teller was
a good deal keener than his interest in the things told. The conversation
revealed to Netta phases in her husband's existence wholly unknown to
her. So Edmund had been in Rome--for two or three years--in the Embassy!
That she had never known. He seemed also to have been an English member
of Parliament for a time. In any case he had lived, apparently for years,
like other men of his kind--shooting, racing, visiting, travelling,
fighting, elections. She could not fit the facts to which both alluded
with her own recollections of the misanthrope who had first made
acquaintance with her and her family in Florence three years before this
date; and her bewilderment grew.

As for the others, they had soon, it seemed, completely forgotten the
thin sallow-faced wife, who sat with her back to the window, restlessly
twisting her rings.

Presently Melrose stopped abruptly--in front of Lady Tatham.

"Where is Edith?" He bent forward peremptorily, his hand on the table,
his eyes on the lady's face.

"At the Cape with her husband."

"Has she found him out yet?"

"There's nothing to find out. He's an excellent fellow."

"A stupid prig," said Melrose passionately. "Well, you did it!--You did