"Will you try to understand?" says Mrs. Monkton, with a light stamp of her foot, her patience going as her grief increases. "He cross-examined me as to where you were, and would be, and I—I told him. I wasn't going to make a mystery of it, or you, was I? I told him that you were going to the Doré Gallery to-day with Tommy. How could I know he would go there to meet you? He never said he was going. You are unjust, Joyce, both to him and to me."
"Do you mean to tell me that for all that you didn't know he would be at that place to-day?" turning flashing eyes upon her sister.
"How could I know? Unless a person says a thing right out, how is one to be sure what he is going to do?"
"Oh! that is unlike you. It is unworthy of you," says Joyce, turning from her scornfully. "You did know. And it is not," turning back again and confronting the now thoroughly frightened Barbara with a glance full of pathos, "it is not that—your insincerity that hurt me so much, it is——"
"I didn't mean to be insincere; you are very cruel—you do not measure your words."
"You will tell me next that you meant it all for the best," with a bitter smile. "That is the usual formula, isn't it? Well, never mind; perhaps you did. What I object to is you didn't tell me. That I was kept designedly in the dark both by him and you. Am I," with sudden fire, "a child or a fool, that you should seek to guide me so blindly? Well," drawing a long breath, "I won't keep you in the dark. When I left the gallery, and your protégé, I met—Mr. Beauclerk!"
Mrs. Monkton, stunned by this intelligence, remains silent for a full minute. It is death to her hopes. If she has met that man again, it is impossible to know how things have gone. His fatal influence—her unfortunate infatuation for him—all will be ruinous to poor Felix's hopes.
"You spoke to him?" asks she at last, in an emotionless tone.
"Yes."
"Was Felix with you?"