"I'm sorry that you should have had this—to distress you. However—"
"Isn't it rather late to think of that now? As to saying it—I should have thought that you would tell me of your sorrow immediately—or not at all."
A long look passed between them. Down the corridor, on both sides of them, flowed a stream of people bent upon mails; but these two were alone in the world.
"Have you seen West?" asked Queed, in a voice unlike his own.
She made a little movement of irrepressible distaste.
"Yes.... But you must not think that he told me. He is too kind, too honorable to betray his friend."
He stared at her, reft of the power of speech.
From under the wide hat, the blue eyes seemed to leap out and stab him; they lingered, turning the knife, while their owner appeared to be waiting for him to speak; and then with a final twist, they were pulled away, and Queed found himself alone in the corridor.
He dropped his long envelope in the slot labeled North, and turned his footsteps toward Duke of Gloucester Street again.
Within him understanding had broken painfully into flame. Miss Weyland believed that he was the author of the unforgivable editorial—he, who had so gladly given, first the best abilities he had, and then his position itself, to the cause of Eva Bernheimer. West had seen her, and either through deliberate falseness or his characteristic fondness for shying off from disagreeable subjects—Queed felt pretty sure it was the latter—had failed to reveal the truth. West's motives did not matter in the least. The terrible situation in which he himself had been placed was all that mattered, and that he must straighten out at once. What dumbness had seized his tongue just now he could not imagine. But it was plain that, however much he would have preferred not to see the girl at all, this meeting had made another one immediately necessary: he must see her at once, to-night, and clear himself wholly of this cruel suspicion. And yet ... he could never clear himself of her having suspected him; he understood that, and it seemed to him a terrible thing. No matter how humble her contrition, how abject her apologies, nothing could ever get back of what was written, or change the fact that she had believed him capable of that.