Boris laughed and then checked his laughter.
"The lady," he said, "is Mademoiselle Vseslavitch, who, as you are probably aware, lives no great distance away."
"So!" murmured Paul, and he nodded his head.
"Yes," said Boris, "and if it is of any interest to you to know it, I propose to marry the lady."
He placed the picture carefully in his breast-pocket.
"You must forgive my being rude," he added, "but I should not now be in this country if I had not every intention of marrying the lady myself."
Boris was a man used to being hard hit. He was steeled against cunningly and swiftly-dealt blows, such as he himself administered, but this declaration of Sir Paul's, that he intended to marry Mademoiselle Vseslavitch, took him quite back.
"Oh!" he exclaimed softly, and his voice had a certain note of surprise in it.
The baronet smiled a little grimly, but his eyes were as serene and as cold as ever.
He realized that he had dealt his host an exceedingly well-landed blow. Then the baronet's smile died, for, following the train of his suspicious thoughts, he instinctively grasped and held on to the idea that just as Boris had been searching his kit-bag for the purpose of blackmail, so that individual purposed marriage with Mademoiselle Vseslavitch to the same end.
It disturbed him so much that the hard eyes hardened. Only the baronet's friends knew that they sometimes hardened because of the softness behind their gaze.
Paul's heart, indeed, rose in revolt against the suggestion that this man should for a moment presume to reach out and touch the hand of Mademoiselle Vseslavitch. Not for such a man as Boris was the girl with the calm yet, at the same time, troubled eyes, that had looked out from the picture.
Paul made a shrewd guess that if Boris had his hopes set on her, the girl with the dark hair and steadfast eyes stood in some peril.
The mere thought of it quickened his blood, and the quickening of his blood livened his brain still more, so that he watched, almost cat-like, the glance of Boris's eyes as they followed the placing of the lady's picture in Paul's pocket.
For a couple of minutes nothing was said. Each man knew instinctively that he must move to the attack, but realized that a mistake at the opening of the game might possibly spell disaster.