It was Eve's practice to tell herself several times a day that she had
no sentiment for Peter Rayner but dislike. She did not attempt to
defend her attitude logically, but nevertheless she clung to it, and
to-night, when he entered the drawing-room, she had endeavoured to
convey by her manner that it was only with the greatest difficulty that
she remembered him at all, and that, having accomplished that feat, she
now intended to forget him again immediately. And he had grinned a
cheerful, affectionate grin, and beamed on her without a break till
bedtime.

Before coming as companion to Mrs. Rastall-Retford Eve had been
governess to Hildebrand, aged six, the son of a Mrs. Elphinstone. It
had been, on the whole, a comfortable situation. She had not liked Mrs.
Elphinstone, but Hildebrand had been docile, and altogether life was
quite smooth and pleasant until Mrs. Elphinstone's brother came for a
visit. Peter Rayner was that brother.

There is a type of man who makes love with the secrecy and sheepish
reserve of a cowboy shooting up a Wild West saloon. To this class Peter
belonged. He fell in love with Eve at sight, and if, at the end of the
first day, there was anyone in the house who was not aware of it, it
was only Hildebrand, aged six. And even Hildebrand must have had his
suspicions.

Mrs. Elphinstone was among the first to become aware of it. For two
days, frostily silent and gimlet-like as to the eye, she observed
Peter's hurricane wooing from afar; then she acted. Peter she sent to
London, pacifying him with an invitation to return to the house in the
following week. This done, she proceeded to eliminate Eve. In the
course of the parting interview she expressed herself perhaps a little