“And is he quite well? Will you give a message to him from me when you write again?”
“I never write.”
Miss Valery looked surprised, pained. Evidently to her sick-room had reached the vaguest possible hints of what had happened. Or else Anne must have refused to hear or credit what she was persuaded was an impossible falsehood. In all good hearts scandal unrepeated, unbelieved, dies a natural death.
To Mrs. Harper's brief, sharp sentence there was no reply; her guest turned to other topics.
“Harriet Dugdale comes home to-morrow. It is not often she takes it into her head to pay a three weeks' visit from home. You must have missed her a good deal.”
“No, I did not. I have never been outside the garden.”
“Was that quite right, my dear? And your sisters-in-law complain bitterly that you will not go to Kingcombe Holm.”
“They should have taken more trouble in coming to ask me.
“Nay, in this world we should not judge too harshly. We cannot see into any one's motives. There may have been reasons. I know the Squire has not been at all well; and Mary has spent her whole time in watching him, and in coming to Thornhurst to nurse me.”
“Have you been so very ill, then? I wish—I wish—”