Stanley, and he is not at all an easy person for a beginner to deceive."
I kept silence. I began to see the trouble into which I was drifting.
"But," she continued, "you did not attempt to deceive me. And in this
matter, Mr. Stanley and I are one!"
"You have told him!" I exclaimed.
"Not yet," she answered, "but I am forced to do so, unless--"
"Unless what?"
She looked me in the face.
"Unless you give me your word of honor that you make no attempt to carry
on the task which Leslie Guest had assigned himself, that you do not
regard yourself in any shape or form as his successor. Don't you see that
it must be so? You plead that you must keep faith with the dead. I, at
least, must keep faith with the living. I offer you a chance of safety,
and I beg you to take it. I can do no more."
There was a sharp, little yap from Nagaski. We looked around, Lady
Dennisford had come out. We turned towards her. Nagaski trotted on ahead.
His demeanor was generally more brisk, and his expression one of relief.
A cloud of anxiety seemed to have rolled away from his small brain.
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