For a moment Sanders knew not what to say. All at once there dawned upon him the realization that now through him, in this utterly untoward, clumsy, miserable way, was Davies for the first time being made aware of what common, every-day rumor said of his wife. He would have cut his tongue out rather than wilfully put in circulation a word of scandal, yet it had been reserved for him to bring to a husband's ears the first ill-omened tidings of a wife's misdoing.
"God forgive me, Davies, if I've blundered!" he burst out at last. "I'll never forgive myself. I supposed—they all talked of it so fully—freely together—I supposed you knew all about it. I never dreamed of harm in it. Mrs. Flight—or rather Mrs. Darling and she together—occasionally went there, and the other ladies had their husbands as a rule, or at least sometimes, and there was good sleighing, you know, between here and town, and absolutely nowhere else were the roads beaten. They sort of had to go there, don't you see?"
"Go there with whom?" said Davies, grasping the rail of the fence and breathing hard.
"Why, with Willett, of course; he was the only fellow that had a good turnout. He used to come for them, I believe, and sometimes he had Mrs. Darling and Mrs. Davies—he and Burtis—and sometimes Mrs. Flight."
"And do you mean that they—that these four, went there to Cresswell's? Do you know this, Sanders?"
"Well," said Sanders, "they were all talking and laughing about it, never dreaming of anything harmful or unbecoming. Why, Parson, old man, you mustn't be too strait-laced out here. You know it's the way of the West."
But Davies threw out his hand as though imploring silence, seemed about to speak again and ask another question, but finally turned without another word, and leaving Sanders standing dejectedly at the gate, re-entered his hall and closed the door behind him.
CHAPTER XXIV.
That night Dr. Rooke called twice at No. 12, and went away both times saying opprobrious things about his fellow-men and women. The chaplain, who had gone over to see Davies about three o'clock, presently went back for his wife, and that good-hearted woman remained until late at night. Mrs. Darling coming over in the early evening to congratulate dear Mira again on her husband's return and invite them both to dinner on the morrow, was met by Davies himself at the door, but not invited in. Her sweet smiles and words of greeting and proffers of hospitality were checked at sight of his stern, sad face. In brief words he told her Mrs. Davies was too ill to receive callers or accept invitations, and in response to her flurried "Is there anything in the world I can do?" coldly answered that Mrs. Darling had already done—too much.