"I am glad of that. You are a very strange girl; I suppose you will marry Captain Carbury some day. You are, of course, quite unaware of the fact that Hawtrey must have loved you beyond the ordinary when he made up his mind to take as a wife the daughter of Major Grayson?"
I sprang to my feet.
"What do you mean by those words?"
"Don't you know, child, don't you know?"
"I know nothing, except that my father is the best man in all the world."
Lady Mary looked at me, at first with scorn, then a strange, new, softened, pitying expression flashed over her face.
"You poor little girl!" she said. "Have you never suspected, have you never guessed, why he married Lady Helen Dalrymple, and why he took her name, and why——"
"Don't tell me any more," I said, "please don't, I would rather not know. Good-bye—you have been kind, you have meant to be very kind, but you are hinting at something quite awful—all the same, I will find out—yes, I will find out! My father do a mean thing! Indeed, you little know him. Good-bye, Lady Mary."
"Stay, child; the carriage must take you home."
"No, I will walk," I said.