'Oh, certainly. And that was at the end of July, and Leven was killed late in June.'
'Yes. That only leaves a month for him to have been to Asia—that's absurd.'
'Utterly, totally, and entirely impossible,' asseverated Mr. Van Torp. 'One of two things. Either this man is your husband, and if he is, he's not the man who found the rubies in Asia. Or else, if he is that man, he's not Leven. I wish that heathen girl had been here yesterday! She could have told in a minute. She'd better have been here anyway than cutting around the Mediterranean with that fellow Logotheti!'
'Yes,' Lady Maud answered gravely. 'But about myself—if Leven is alive, what is my position—I mean—I don't really quite know where I am, do I?'
'Anybody but you would have thought of marrying again already,' observed Mr. Van Torp, looking up sideways to her eyes, for she was taller than he. 'Then you'd really be in a bad fix, wouldn't you? The Enoch Arden thing, I suppose it would be. But as it is, I don't see that it makes much difference. The man's going under [{331}] a false name, so he doesn't mean to claim you as his wife, nor to try and get a divorce again, as he did before. He's just going to be somebody else for his own good, and he'll get married that way, maybe. That's his business, not yours. I don't suppose you're going to get up in church and forbid the banns, are you?'
'I would, like a shot!' said Lady Maud. 'So would you, I'm sure! Think of the other woman!'
'That's so,' answered Van Torp without enthusiasm. 'However, we've got to think about you and the present, and decide what we'll do. I suppose the best thing is for me to put him off with some excuse, so that you can come on the yacht.'
'Please do nothing of the sort!' cried Lady Maud.
'But I want you to come,' objected her friend.
'I mean to come. Do you think I am afraid to meet him?'