"Do you realise," he began gravely, "what you accuse Mrs. Blake of?"
Lydia had not been used to think of her by that name and she asked, with lifted glance:
"Esther?"
"Yes. Mrs. Jeffrey Blake."
"She took the necklace," said Lydia. She spoke with the dull obstinacy that made Anne shake her sometimes and then kiss her into kindness, she was so pretty.
But Alston Choate, she saw, was not going to find it a road to prettiness. He was after the truth like a dog on a scent, and he didn't think he had it yet.
"Madame Beattie," he said, "tells you she believes that Esther—" his voice slipped caressingly on the word with the lovingness of usage, and Lydia saw he called her Esther in his thoughts—"Madame Beattie tells you she believes that Esther did this—this incredible thing."
The judicial aspect fell away from him, and the last words carried only the man's natural distaste. Lydia saw now that whether she was believed or not, she was bound to be most unpopular. But she stood to her guns.
"Madame Beattie knows it. Esther owned it, I told you."
"Owned it to Madame Beattie?"