"I hope you did not come here meaning to insult me," said Janetta, starting to her feet; "but I think you cannot know what you are saying, Lady Caroline. I want my cousin to marry your daughter? I never thought of such a thing—until yesterday!"
"And what made you think of it yesterday, pray? Please let us have no heroics, no hysterics: these exhibitions of temper are so unseemly. What made you think so yesterday?"
"Mr. Brand came here," said Janetta, suddenly growing very white, "and told me that he cared for Margaret. I do not know how they had met. He did not tell me. He—he—cares very much for her."
"Cares for her! What next? He came here—when? At Margaret's lesson-time, I suppose?"
She saw from Janetta's face that her guess was correct.
"I need hardly say that Margaret will not come here again," said Lady Caroline, rising and drawing her laces closely around her. "There is the amount due to you, Miss Colwyn. I calculated it before I came out, and I think you will find it all right. There is one more question I must really ask before I go: there seems some uncertainty concerning the fate of Mr. Brand's first wife; perhaps you can tell me whether she is alive or dead?"
Poor Janetta scarcely knew what to say. But she told herself that truth was always best.
"I believe he—he—is divorced from her," she stammered, knowing full well how very condemnatory her words must sound in Lady Caroline's ear. They certainly produced a considerable effect.
"Divorced? And you introduced him to Margaret? Of course I know that a divorcé is often received in society, and so on, but I always set my face against the prevalent lax views of marriage, and I hoped that I had brought up my daughter to do the same. I suppose"—satirically—"you did not think it worth while to tell Margaret this little fact?"
"I did not know it then," Janetta forced herself to say.