"What do you know about the length of his letter to me?" she asked.
Edith saw her mistake. The instinct that said "I must know, I must know!" had been wonderfully ill-inspired in its notions of how to find out.
"I happened to take it up; it was a thick letter," she said, hopelessly trying to efface her steps, giving as reason an irrational excuse.
"I don't know the thickness of Edward's letter to you," said Elizabeth. "It is no concern of mine how many sheets he writes you."
She paused a moment.
"You speak as if you resent Edward's writing to me at all," she added.
Edith saw that she could get at nothing in this way. Swiftly and unexpectedly she shifted her attack, answering Elizabeth's comment by another question.
"Why does he keep away from Heathmoor?" she said.
Elizabeth had not been expecting anything of this kind. She winced as from a blow, and had to wait a moment before she could trust her voice to be steady.
"Has he not told you?" she asked. "I thought it was work during the week, and a couple of visits for the Sundays that he is away."