"I suppose because there was so much else to say. We should have come round to it in time. I did tell you everything but his name."
"And the circumstances."
"How do you mean—the circumstances?"
"I got the impression from you this morning that it was some millionaire Johnny who'd come to your father's aid by advancing the sum in the ordinary way of business. I didn't understand that it was a comparatively poor chap who was cleaning himself out to come to yours."
In wording his phrase he purposely went beyond the warrant, in order to rouse her to denial, or perhaps to indignation. But she said only:
"Did Drusilla say it was to come to my aid?"
"She didn't say it—exactly. I gathered that it was what she thought."
She astonished him by saying, simply: "I think so, too."
"Extraordinary! Do you mean to say he dropped out of a clear sky?"
"I must answer that by both a yes and a no. He did drop out of a clear sky just lately; but I'd known him before."