“Why do you ask?” he said sharply. “What can you know about her?”
“Only—that Mrs. Hayes-Billington was formerly Mrs. de Lacy.”
On hearing this announcement Captain Falkland turned hastily round so as to confront me face to face; he looked almost pale.
“What did you say?” he demanded, speaking in a hard voice, strangely unlike his usual tone.
“Exactly what I have told you,” I replied. “Of course I need not assure you we never knew this at Torrington, but you can’t very well ask a lady for her reference or character as if she were a housemaid. Mrs. Hayes-Billington was received with open arms at Silliram, she became a great social success, and was taking the principal part in The Scrap of Paper when one of the audience recognised her and gave her away.”
“So I should hope. Fancy that woman daring to undertake to chaperon a young girl! Well, tell me what happened next?”
“A man who called on us recognised her and wrote down to Ronnie. He arrived the very morning after the explosion and took me off at once. The whole station was shaken to its foundation; there was a tremendous social earthquake, and Mrs. Hayes-Billington was cast out of the club just as if she had been a live cobra. I may confess to you that in my heart I pitied her. Like some drowning creature she had struggled to the bank, but was seized and flung back into deep water.”
“Now I can understand why Mrs. Soames was so anxious to conceal the date of your arrival in India,” he observed, entirely ignoring my protest, “and so far she has been wonderfully successful.”
“Mr. Balthasar may give me away,” I suggested.
“In that case, I’ll shoot him! But he won’t. More likely he’ll try and blackmail you. If he does, just hand him over to me.”