"No—yes; just for the moment, perhaps."
"Are you still determined not to let me efface it for you?"
"You couldn't; no one can. It can never be effaced."
His smile was the man's smile of superior wisdom.
"Don't we always say that when the trouble is personal?"
She ignored the query completely, and her rejoinder was totally irrelevant—or it seemed to be.
"You think I came down here to ask you to send over to Alta Vista for Professor Gardiner. That was merely an excuse. I wanted to beg you once again to suspend judgment—not to be vindictive."
Again he dissimulated. "I'm not vindictive: why should I be?"
"You have every reason; or, at least, you believe you have." She leaned over the arm of the driving-seat and searched his eyes pleadingly: "Please tell me: how much did Mr. Wingfield find out?"
It was blankly impossible to tell her the hideous truth, or anything remotely approaching it. But his parrying of her question was passing skilless.