“I think it is very dramatic,” said Ralph Webster, slowly. He forced himself to speak the commonplace words, but he was not thinking commonplace thoughts.
“Now, there was something in this man’s face,” went on the actress, “that told me a story. John Temple is grieving about something that has cut his heart-strings. It can’t be money in his case because for one thing he never cared very much about it, and for another he will ultimately, as Mr. Harrison described it, succeed to his uncle’s property, and with such prospects he could borrow as much as he liked, I suppose. No, it is about some woman! He was looking down into the dusky river when I first saw him. Can he have driven some poor soul to seek for refuge in its gloomy depths?”
Ralph Webster inwardly shuddered, but Kathleen Weir little thought how near she was to the truth.
“He is miserable about some woman,” she repeated, “and that is why I have sent for you to-day. I am in the way, I suppose, and I don’t want to be in the way any longer. I want to be free, and of course he does. Now, how can I find out about his life, for if I could find out, I expect I could go triumphantly through the ordeal of the divorce court.”
Webster was silent for a few moments; he was thinking the knowledge of John Temple’s second marriage would not free him from his first. It would bring disgrace to him, but not liberty to her.
“You would have to show a case against him besides this supposed woman,” he said, slowly. “Did he ever treat you cruelly?”
“You mean did he ever punch my head, or pull my hair?” answered Kathleen, with a hard, little laugh. “No, I can not truthfully say he ever did; but I might say it untruthfully, and he would be too glad to get rid of me to contradict me.”
“But it would be very dangerous; you would have to prove it.”
“At all events he forsook me?”
“I thought you parted by mutual consent?”