'From Craigmhor?'
'Yes; you left before I did, you remember?'
'Sudden business called me to town. When you left how were our fair friends at Birkwoodbrae?'
It was terrible for Mary to sit there helplessly and overhear this conversation; but there was a buzzing sound in her ears, and she failed to catch Colville's answer; and Sleath spoke again—
'I knew you were deuced spooney on the eldest one. Got over it all now, of course—pour passer le temps.'
'Spooney? I do not choose to have this term applied either to myself or the lady referred to.'
'As you please. But surely you had no more intention of committing yourself seriously with her than I had with her younger sister?'
'What do you mean by talking of these young ladies in this style to me?' asked Colville, in a voice that seemed to have suppressed passion in it, for at that moment he was recalling some of Doctor Wodrow's communications regarding the speaker.
'Why, what on earth are they to you? demanded Sleath, focussing him with his eyeglass.
Mary did not hear the response, but was aware that Sleath started and said,