“Then you were with her?” asked Freda quickly.
“Yes, why not?” he asked with a puzzled frown. “Isn’t she all right?”
“God knows whether she’s all right or not, but she’s got a horrible reputation.”
“Jean Byrne!” exclaimed Mauney, incredulously.
“Yes,” she nodded impatiently. “Mrs. Poynton has been very injudicious. I have never really interested myself in the details and I hate saying such things about anyone, but I simply couldn’t believe that you had associated yourself with her in any way. But now that you admit it I suppose I am obliged to tell you more. It’s all over town that you stayed at her house all night.”
Mauney’s mouth opened to speak. Then his face suddenly grew pale and he gazed in silence past her head into the woods that rose at the side of the road.
“Well, aren’t you going to deny it?” she asked in a tone of surprise.
“Surely I don’t need to?” he said a little angrily. “Surely you don’t believe them?”
“If I were eighteen I’d say no. But I’m twenty-six, unfortunately. And still more unfortunately, some things are true no matter how much we don’t believe them. I think,” she added precisely, “it’s only a fair proposition that you should either deny it or make some intelligent explanation.”
Mauney’s face, as it lowered slightly towards his breast, was that of a man for whom the light of the world had suddenly gone out.