But with her next question Conscience forced him from his defense of jocular evasiveness.
"Did you know, Stuart, that—that Mrs. Holbury came to see me?"
He feared that she had caught his flinch of surprise at that announcement but he replied evenly:
"Marian wrote to me that she had seen you. How you two happened to meet, I have never guessed."
"She came here, Stuart, to explain things which she thought put you in an unsightly light—and to say that whatever blame there was belonged to her."
"She did that?" Stuart Farquaharson's face reddened to the temples and his voice became feelingly defensive. "If Marian told you that she had been more to blame than I, she let her generosity do her a wrong. I can't accept an advantage gained at such a cost, Conscience. I think all of her mistakes grew out of an exaggerated innocence and she's paid high enough for them. Marian Holbury is a woman who needs no defense unless it's against pure slander."
"Stuart," Conscience's voice was deep with earnestness, "a woman only sets herself a task like that because she loves a man."
"Oh, no," he hastily demurred. "It may be from friendship, too."
But his companion shook her head. "With her it was love. She told me so."