"Just the truth. Tell him that I am remaining in the dining-room because I think his task will be easier with you in my absence. He has got himself into some mess with that woman."
"With Lady Ongar?"
"Yes; not that her name was mentioned between us, but I suppose it is so."
"Horrible woman;—wicked, wretched creature!"
"I know nothing about that, nor, as I suppose, do you."
"My dear, you must have heard."
"But if I had,—and I don't know that I have,—I need not have believed. I am told that she married an old man who is now dead, and I suppose she wants a young husband."
"My dear!"
"If I were you, Cissy, I would say as little as might be about her. She was an old friend of Harry's—"
"She jilted him when he was quite a boy; I know that;—long before he had seen our Florence."