'It is nonsense,' the doctor agreed. 'The man was obviously misinformed.'
'It doesn't refer to my age at all,' said Mrs Tresize, positively. 'It—it alludes to something quite different. I was barely nineteen when I married.'
'If you can guess to what it alludes—'
'Reported good money, but near—' read the widow, paused, and uttered a liquid laugh. 'Oh, I am glad you showed me this. We'll punish him for that, doctor, if he dares to turn up.'
'If,' echoed the doctor, with a glance at the gun-racks.
'I ought to go and warn Tryphena.'
'Every moment may be precious,' he agreed again, while she went to the chimney-place and fetched the now boiling kettle.
She mixed the drink and set it close before him, where he leaned pondering a pile of gold he had poured upon the table from one of the canvas bags. The steam mounting from the glass bedimmed his spectacles. He took them off to wipe them, and perceived that she was smiling. She bit her lip at being thus caught.
'I was thinking,' she made haste to explain, 'what a funny situation 'twould be if by any chance the man was innocent, and you'd driven off with money that honestly belonged to him.'
'Honest men don't put on women's clothes to tramp the moors at night,' Doctor Unonius objected.