"One of her relations is a big-wig at the Admiralty."
"That fact, and what she picked up from other of her naval friends, enabled her," said John, "to give a guess at when the Malta would leave ——"
Mrs. Beecher Monmouth became suddenly very still.
"How did you know that, Bernard?" she asked.
John observed a hardening of the line of her mouth.
"I merely put two and two together and assumed it," he said. Then, quietly daring, he leaned forward, unobserved by others in the room, and seized Mrs. Beecher Monmouth's hand.
"Is it true?" he questioned.
She looked at him a long minute, and then smiled, but there was a cruel light in her eyes.
"It is true," pursued John.
A silence followed; then Mrs. Beecher Monmouth inclined her fine head very slightly. John was dexterous enough not to slide his hand away from hers too soon. The aversion he felt from her made him remove it as soon as he reasonably could. Then he drew in a deep breath.