"How long has she been in Rome?" Fenton asked.
He had suddenly become graver. He had been intimate with Mrs. Greyson, a sculptor of no mean talent, in the days when he had been a fervid opponent of people and of principles with whom he had later joined alliance, and the idea of her return brought up vividly his parting from her, when she had scornfully upbraided him for his apostasy from convictions which he had again and again declared to be dearer to him than life.
"It is six years," Mrs. Fenton answered. "Caldwell was born the March after she went, and he will be six in three weeks. Time goes fast. We are getting to be old people."
Fenton stared at his plate absently, his thoughts busy with the past.
"Has Grant Herman been married six years?" he asked, after a moment.
"Grant Herman? Yes; he was married just before she sailed; but what of it?"
Fenton laid down the fork with which he had been poking the bits of fish about on his plate. He folded his arms on the edge of the table, and regarded his wife.
"It is astonishing, Edith," he observed, "how well one may know a woman and yet be mistaken in her. For six years I have supposed you to be religiously avoiding any allusion to Helen's love for Grant Herman, and it seems you never knew it at all."
It was Mrs. Fenton's turn to look up in surprise.
"What do you mean?" she asked.