Struck literally speechless, Eleanor stood, her hand on the table, and stared at the figure with wide open eyes, while she felt cold and terror seize every limb. What did this apparition want with her or hers? A sickly dread, a kind of dim first suspicion of the meaning of it all crept into her heart.
‘Miss Askam,’ said this spectre of Ada Dixon, in a low and husky voice, ‘I’m in trouble.’
‘Yes,’ almost gasped the other.
‘I’m come to you, since it was no use writing to your brother. Where is he?’
The tongue of Eleanor at first clave to the roof of her mouth; at last, in a hoarse voice, she asked—
‘What have you to do with my brother?’
With a swift motion, Ada unfastened the pin at her throat; her shawl slid from her shoulders to the ground, and she confronted Eleanor.
Trembling overpowered the latter. Speech was at first denied her. She could stand no more, but crouched upon a chair, and gasped out—
‘Oh, horrible, horrible!’
Suddenly a wild gleam of hope crossed her mind. Why was she assuming the very worst to have happened? By what right did she condemn not only Otho, but Ada? She sprang up again, went close to the girl, and almost whispered—