"Oh, yes, you have, believe me. You heard it five years ago. I am Captain Willoughby."
Ethne drew sharply back; the bright colour paled in her cheeks; her lips set in a firm line, and her eyes grew very hard. She glowered at him silently.
Captain Willoughby was not in the least degree discomposed. He took his time to speak, and when he did it was rather with the air of a man forgiving a breach of manners, than of one making his excuses.
"I can quite understand that you do not welcome me, Miss Eustace, but none of us could foresee that you would be present when the three white feathers came into Feversham's hands."
Ethne swept the explanation aside.
"How do you know that I was present?" she asked.
"Feversham told me."
"You have seen him?"
The cry leaped loudly from her lips. It was just a throb of the heart made vocal. It startled Ethne as much as it surprised Captain Willoughby. She had schooled herself to omit Harry Feversham from her thoughts, and to obliterate him from her affections, and the cry showed to her how incompletely she had succeeded. Only a few minutes since she had spoken of him as one whom she looked upon as dead, and she had believed that she spoke the truth.
"You have actually seen him?" she repeated in a wondering voice. She gazed at her stolid companion with envy. "You have spoken to him? And he to you? When?"