"Ay!" said Hawthwaite. "As I said just now, I'd have given a good deal to know. But Krevin Crood is a deep, designing, secret sort of man, and that woman, whoever she may be, looks just the same."
"Has she been with Mrs. Saumarez long?" asked Brent.
"Came with her, when Mrs. Saumarez first came and took the Abbey House," replied Hawthwaite. "Always been with her; went away with her when Mrs. S. was in the South of France all last winter. Odd couple I call the two of 'em, Mr. Brent; between you and myself."
"Why, exactly?" inquired Brent. "I've seen nothing particularly odd about Mrs. Saumarez, except that she's evidently a highly-strung, perhaps a bit excitable sort of woman, all nerves, I should say, and possibly a bit emotional. Clever woman, I think, and pretty."
"Pretty enough—and clever enough," assented Hawthwaite dryly. "And I dare say you're right about the rest. But I'll tell you why I used that term; at least, in regard to her. When Mrs. Saumarez first came here, it was understood that she was the widow of a naval officer of high rank. Well, naturally, the big folk of the neighbourhood called on her when she'd settled down—she furnished and fitted her house from local shops, and it took her some time to get fixed up—expecting, of course, that she'd return their calls. She never returned a single one! Not one, sir!"
"That certainly sounds odd," admitted Brent.
"Ay, doesn't it?" said Hawthwaite. "You'd have thought that a young and stylish woman, coming to live here as she did, would have been glad of society. But, though some dozen or so ladies of the place called on her, she never, as I say, returned a single call; in fact, it very soon became evident that she didn't want any society of that sort. She used to go out bicycling a good deal by herself in those early days—that, I fancy, was how she got to know both Wellesley and your cousin. She was fond enough of their society anyway!"
"Always?" asked Brent. He was learning things that he had never heard of, and was already thinking deeply about them. "From the beginning?"
"Well, practically," replied Hawthwaite. "First it was the doctor; then it was Wallingford. And," he added, with a wink, "there are folk in the town who declare that she carried on with both, playing one off against the other, till the very end! I don't know how that may be, but I do know that at one time she and Wellesley were very thick, and that afterwards your cousin was always running after her. Naturally, there was talk, especially amongst the folk who'd called on her and whose calls she didn't return. And, to tell you the plain truth, they said things."