Luna broke
in, "but I must say that I think my sister was strangely communicative.
She told you ever so much that I wouldn't have breathed."
"I should like to try you with something you know!" Matthias Pardon
returned imperturbably. "This isn't a fair trial, because you don't
know. Miss Chancellor came round--came round considerably, there's no
doubt of that; because a year or two ago she was terribly
unapproachable. If I have mollified her, madam, why shouldn't I mollify
you? She realises that I can help her now, and as I ain't rancorous I am
willing to help her all she'll let me. The trouble is, she won't let me
enough, yet; it seems as if she couldn't believe it of me. At any rate,"
he pursued, addressing himself more particularly to Ransom, "half an
hour ago, at the Hall, they knew nothing whatever about Miss Tarrant,
beyond the fact that about a month ago she came there, with Miss
Chancellor, to try her voice, which rang all over the place, like
silver, and that Miss Chancellor guaranteed her absolute punctuality
to-night."
"Well, that's all that is required," said Ransom, at hazard; and he put
out his hand, in farewell, to Mrs. Luna.
"Do you desert me already?" she demanded, giving him a glance which
would have embarrassed any spectator but a reporter of the _Vesper_.
"I have fifty things to do; you must excuse me." He was nervous,
restless, his heart was beating much faster than usual; he couldn't
stand still, and he had no compunction whatever about leaving her to get
rid, by herself, of Mr.
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