"I've been sent for--to come to the prison to see--"
"Not him!" said Modderwell.
Eades started suddenly forward.
"No," said Elizabeth calmly, enjoying the situation, "his sister."
"His sister!"
"Yes," she turned to her mother. "You know, dear; Gusta. She's been arrested."
"Oh!" exclaimed Mrs. Ward. "Elizabeth! The idea! What impertinence! Who could have brought such an insolent message!" She looked at Marriott, as did the others.
"The idea!" Mrs. Ward went on. "Why, I had no notion he was her brother. To think of our harboring such people!"
Mrs. Ward stiffened in her chair, with glances from time to time for Marriott and Elizabeth, in an attitude of chilling and austere social disapproval; then, as if she had forgotten to claim the reassurance she felt to be certain, she leaned forward, out of the attitude as it were, to say:
"Of course you sent the reply her assurance deserved."