‘Absolutely. But very soon after that, you see, it didn’t matter. I got turned out.’
Mr. Trimblerigg was now feeling very happy, for he saw that Davidina was right out of her bearings. But without appearing to notice this unusual phenomenon he went quietly on:
‘After all it’s a good thing as it happens. If you had to divide with me now you wouldn’t have enough for your expeditions.’
‘Plenty,’ she assured him. ‘Ah, to be sure, I haven’t told you. And yet that’s why it was important that I should know; for I didn’t suppose his old two hundred would matter to you much now. But the other day I got news: opening a new quarry they struck a seam of something else quite unexpected; it isn’t exactly plumbago, or Cumberland lead as they call it; but it’s rather like it; and as a consequence the property is up to something like twenty times its value.’
Mr. Trimblerigg took it very quietly; he made no sign; even now he was not sure that he wished things differently. He had a great desire, for his own spiritual comfort, to get the better of Davidina, just once.
‘Well, I congratulate you,’ he said; ‘where will the next expedition be? The Sahara, Persia, Arabia? It looks as if you were going to be a famous woman traveller; you’ve always had the pluck and the brain; and now you’ve got the means for it.’
‘Do you mind, Jonathan?’ she asked him.
‘Mind? I’m delighted.’
‘This is the first time,’ she confessed, ‘that you’ve ever taken me by surprise. You knew, and you didn’t say anything. You knew, and you let them turn you out. You knew, and you trusted me.’
‘I’ve always trusted you.’