Her glance met his for a moment, and then her eyes dropped again.

“Is it true that you have never left Trevlyn all your life?”

“Except for a few days with Arthur, never.”

“You have never seen London?”

“No, never,” very emphatically.

“Nor wish to do so?”

“No.”

He mused a little. Somehow it was more difficult than he had believed to convey to her the information he had desired to hint at. He entered upon another topic.

“Have you ever been advised, Lady Monica, to try what the German baths could do for Arthur? Very wonderful cures sometimes are accomplished there.”

[89]

[89]

She raised her head suddenly, with something of a flash in her eyes.

“Tom Pendrill has been talking to you!”

“Indeed, no.”

“That is what he wants—what he is always driving at. He does not care how my poor boy suffers, if only he has the pleasure of experimenting upon him for the benefit of science. I will not have it. It would kill him, it would kill me. You do not know how he suffers in being moved; a journey like that would be murder. He can live nowhere but at Trevlyn—Trevlyn or the neighbourhood, at least. Promise me never to suggest such a thing, never to take sides against me in it. Mr. Trevlyn, I appeal to your honour and your humanity. Promise me never to league [90]with Tom Pendrill to send Arthur away to die!”

[90]

He had never seen her so vehement or excited. He was astonished at the storm he had aroused.

“Indeed, Lady Monica, you may trust me,” he said. “I have not the least wish to distress you, or to urge anything in opposition to your wishes. The idea merely occurred to me, because I happen to have heard of many 

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