“She was very unhappy; you had said something, without knowing it, which gave her a great shock. She was hardly mistress of herself; you must have seen that.”
“But why was I to be sent away, like a child, without any explanation? When I had just been doing a very difficult thing, too, to try to help her!”
“What was the difficult thing?”
“I had called at ‘Stone House,’ and seen this man who calls himself Mr. Banks, and got him to promise that he wouldn’t get into ‘The Towers’ at night, as he has done twice, and frighten her.”
At this, much to her indignation, Rudolph’s mouth curved into an irrepressible smile. Mabin sprang up. But before she had fled very far, he caught her up, and insisted on keeping pace with her, as she ran toward the house.
“Stop, Mabin, and consider. If you run into the house, you will go straight into Mrs. Dale’s arms; and if you don’t, I will send her to your room after you. You had much better ‘have it out’ with me.”
So she turned and confronted him fiercely.
“Why did you laugh at me?”
“I can hardly tell you. No, don’t go off again; I mean that the reason is part of a secret that is not mine.”
“A secret, of course; I knew that. A secret which has been confided to you, but which I am not to know.”