'Totty, I want to ask you something.' He spoke with deepest earnestness, taking her hand. 'You won't keep anything from me, now? I want to know if Thyrza has talked to you about—about her marriage.'
'Why do you want to know that?' the girl asked, in a hard voice.
'I'll speak plainer, Totty. Be a good girl, Totty dear! Tell me what I want to know! Has she ever said anything to make you think that—that she liked any one better than Grail?'
What a coil was here! She had pulled her hand away, furious with him for his shamelessness. Yet self-respect did not allow her to speak vehemently.
'It seems to me,' she said, 'you'd better go and ask her.'
He hung in doubt. Totty added, with more show of feeling:
'Thyrza Trent's a little fool. You may tell her I said so, if you like. If you know all about it, what do you come bothering me for at this time o' night? I'm not going to be mixed up in such things, so I tell you! And there's an end of it!'
She left him. He stood and saw her re-enter the house.
Then is was true. 'If you know all about it,' ... 'I'm not going to be mixed up in such things.' ... Totty had been told, either by Thyrza herself or by someone already spreading the story. The story was true.
He was struck with weakness. Sweat broke out from all his body. Nothing he had ever heard had seemed to him so terrible. A girl like Thyrza! He had held her honesty as sure as the rising of day out of night.