“I suppose I was.”
“With your husband?”
“No, I was not in love with my husband, he was twenty years older than I. When I was eighteen I was very much in love with a young fellow who used to come to play croquet at our place. But my parents wouldn't hear of it. I was not at all strong when I was a girl; they said I wouldn't live, so I didn't care what became of me. Lord Seveley admired me; it was a very good match, I was anxious to get away from home, so I married him. You are quite wrong in supposing I treated him badly.”
“Forgive me, don't say any more about that.”
“We had rows, it is true; he said horrible things about my mother, and I wouldn't stand that, of course.”
“What things?”
“Oh, I can't tell you—no matter. Once I said that I wouldn't have married him only I thought I was going to die. He never forgave me that. It was, I admit, a foolish thing to say.”
At that moment the curtain came down, and the young men moved out of the stalls. “There are two men I know,” she said, fixing her glass. “Do you see them? The elder of the two is Harding, the novelist, the other is Mr. Fletcher, an Irishman.”
“I know Fletcher—or, rather, I know of him. His father was a shopkeeper in Gort, the nearest town to Mount Rorke Castle.”
“He is a journalist, isn't he? I hear he is doing pretty well.”