“You mean that it is my business to explain what Mary has told you. I can’t, so there’s an end of it.”
“What do you mean by that?” she asked in clear, distant tones.
“Precisely what I say, Rhoda. And I am obliged to ask what you mean by this odd way of speaking to me. What has happened since we parted this morning?”
Rhoda could not suppress her astonishment; she gazed fixedly at him.
“If you can’t explain this letter, who can?”
“I suppose Mrs. Widdowson would be able to account for her doings. I certainly am not able to. And it seems to me that you are strangely forgetful of something that passed between us yesterday.”
“Of what?” she asked coldly, her face, which was held proudly up, turning towards the sea.
“Evidently you accuse me of concealing something from you. Please to remember a certain plain question you asked me, and the equally plain answer I gave.”
He detected the beginning of a smile about her rigid lips.
“I remember,” she said.