‘In substance, all.’
‘And was the fellow-prisoner his accomplice and a murderer, too? But, of course, he gives a better account of himself than of his friend; it is needless to ask. This will supply the rest of them here with something new to talk about. Casby, Arthur tells me—’
‘Stay, mother! Stay, stay!’ He interrupted her hastily, for it had not entered his imagination that she would openly proclaim what he had told her.
‘What now?’ she said with displeasure. ‘What more?’
‘I beg you to excuse me, Mr Casby—and you, too, Mrs Finching—for one other moment with my mother—’
He had laid his hand upon her chair, or she would otherwise have wheeled it round with the touch of her foot upon the ground. They were still face to face. She looked at him, as he ran over the possibilities of some result he had not intended, and could not foresee, being influenced by Cavalletto’s disclosure becoming a matter of notoriety, and hurriedly arrived at the conclusion that it had best not be talked about; though perhaps he was guided by no more distinct reason than that he had taken it for granted that his mother would reserve it to herself and her partner.
‘What now?’ she said again, impatiently. ‘What is it?’
‘I did not mean, mother, that you should repeat what I have communicated. I think you had better not repeat it.’
‘Do you make that a condition with me?’
‘Well! Yes.’