“And to me,” Mary replied with an air of indifference.
“Well, then, let us take it for granted that I was rather harsh with Rhoda. But suppose she still meets me with the remark that things are just as they were—that nothing has been explained?”
“I can’t discuss your relations with Miss Nunn.”
“However, you defend her original action. Be so good as to admit that I can’t go to Mrs. Widdowson and request her to publish a statement that I have never—”
“I shall admit nothing,” interrupted Miss Barfoot rather tartly. “I have advised you to see Miss Nunn—if she is willing. And there’s nothing more to be said.”
“Good. I will write to her.”
* * *
He did so, in the fewest possible words, and received an answer of equal brevity. In accordance with permission granted, on the Monday evening he found himself once more in his cousin’s drawing-room, sitting alone, waiting Miss Nunn’s appearance. He wondered how she would present herself, in what costume. Her garb proved to be a plain dress of blue serge, certainly not calculated for effect; but his eye at once distinguished the fact that she had arranged her hair as she wore it when he first knew her, a fashion subsequently abandoned for one that he thought more becoming.
They shook hands. Externally Barfoot was the more agitated, and his embarrassment appeared in the awkward words with which he began.
“I had made up my mind never to come until you let me know that I was tried and acquitted But after all it is better to have reason on one’s side.”