“And I was coming to you,” he said roughly. “What has that little idiot been saying to Crellock to put him in such a rage?”
“Sit down,” she said, pushing a chair towards him, and there was a look in her eyes he had never seen before.
“Well, there. Now be sharp. I don’t care to be bothered with trifles; I’ve had troubles enough. Has that champagne been put to cool?”
She looked, half wonderingly, in the heavy, sensual face, growing daily more flushed and changed.
“Come, go on,” he said, as if the look troubled him. “Now, then, what is it? Crellock is half mad. She has offended him horribly.”
“She has been defending her father’s honour,” said Mrs Hallam slowly.
“Defending my honour?” he said, smiling. “Ah!” Mrs Hallam clasped her hands, and a sigh full of the agony of her heart escaped her lips. The scales seemed to be falling from her eyes, but she wilfully closed them again in her passion of love and trust.
But it was in vain. Something seemed to be tearing these scales away—something seemed to be rending that thick veil of love, and the voices she had so long quelled were clamouring to be heard, and making her ears sing with the terrible tale they told.
She writhed in spirit. She denied it all as a calumny, but as she walked to and fro there the tiny voices in her soul seemed to be ringing out the destruction of her idol, and to her swimming eyes it seemed tottering to its fall.
“You are very strange,” he said roughly. “What’s the matter? I thought you were going to tell me about Julia and Steve.”