But Sir Thomas was not in a frame of mind at all suited to the sifting of evidence. He did not care to say anything about Mrs. Jones; he got no crumb of comfort out of that view of the matter. Things had come out, unwittingly for the most part, in his conversations with Mollett, which made him quite certain as to the truth of the main part of the story. All those Dorsetshire localities were well known to the man, the bearings of the house, the circumstances of Mr. Wainwright's parsonage, the whole history of those months; so that on this subject Sir Thomas had no doubt; and we may as well know at once that there was no room for doubt. Our friend of the Kanturk Hotel, South Main Street, Cork, was the man who, thirty years before, had married the child-daughter of the Dorsetshire parson.
Mr. Prendergast, however, stood awhile before the fire balancing the evidence. "The woman must have known him," he said to himself, "and surely she could tell us whether he be like the man. And Lady Fitzgerald herself would know; but then who would have the hardness of heart to ask Lady Fitzgerald to confront that man?"
He remained with Sir Thomas that day for hours. The long winter evening had begun to make itself felt by its increasing gloom before he left him. Wine and biscuits were sent in to them, but neither of them even noticed the man who brought them. Twice in the day, however, Mr. Prendergast gave the baronet a glass of sherry, which the latter swallowed unconsciously; and then, at about four, the lawyer prepared to take his leave. "I will see you early to-morrow," said he, "immediately after breakfast."
"You are going then?" said Sir Thomas, who greatly dreaded being left alone.
"Not away, you know," said Mr. Prendergast. "I am not going to leave the house."
"No," said Sir Thomas; "no, of course not, but—" and then he paused.
"Eh!" said Mr. Prendergast, "you were saying something."
"They will be coming in to me now," said Sir Thomas, wailing like a child; "now, when you are gone; and what am I to say to them?"
"I would say nothing at present; nothing to-day."
"And my wife?" he asked, again. Through this interview he studiously called her his wife. "Is—is she to know it?"