“I came to talk over your great news,” he answered with a smile.
“It is great news, isn’t it? Great and good news, for I hope soon it will free me of John Temple.”
“But—what have you to go upon?”
“I will find something to go upon,” said the actress, half impatiently. “I have his address, at all events, now, for he is sure to go to Woodlea Hall and look after his property, and I must find someone—or—” and she paused and thought for a moment, and then clapped her hands. “I must find someone,” she repeated, “to go to him, or go myself. There, Mr. Webster, what do you think of that? What do you think of my going to visit my lord in his new state? I would be a welcome visitor, wouldn’t I, and no doubt could make a splendid bargain with him in his eagerness to get rid of me.”
“But—it would expose you to a very painful scene.”
“I am accustomed to scenes, you know,” answered Kathleen Weir, with a little laugh. “Do you know I think it is a splendid idea. At all events, we might mutually agree to meet somewhere, and arrange also mutually to get rid of each other.”
“But what about the Queen’s Proctor intervening?”
Kathleen Weir gave an airy shrug of her shoulders.
“We must manage to be too clever for the Queen’s Proctor, and John Temple, I’m certain, will be only too glad to back me up in anything I say. I shall have some handfuls of hair ready, and swear he tore them out of my head.” And Kathleen Weir laughed.
But Ralph Webster did not laugh. He was thinking of May Churchill, and how her fate might hang on the false words of this woman’s tongue, and he looked very grave when he rose to go away.