She was so very direct that I nearly came out with the truth. But it was absurd, on the face of it, to confess a crazy love for one I had known only half an hour: she would take so sudden a declaration as an insult. I therefore held my peace and fenced. "Miss Destiny, from what she said at Mootley, seems to know something about that glass eye, which was stolen from Mrs. Caldershaw's head when she was dead. I wish to learn all about it, so as to discover why the eye was stolen and the woman murdered."
"Then you did come here to question my aunt, in spite of your denial?"
"Well, if I must confess it, I came to ask about the glass eye."
Miss Monk walked on in silence, and then again spoke abruptly. "You should be honest with me, Mr. Vance."
"I am honest."
"Pardon me, you are not, since you said that you did not see what my aunt could tell you." And she looked like an offended goddess.
This was brutally true: I had equivocated. "I throw myself on your mercy."
She turned a pair of surprised eyes in my direction. "Why on mine?"
"I appear to have offended you," I hesitated.
"What does that matter? we are strangers."