Not long before she had refused to talk or to listen. But now she must know why Leslie had gone. She was anxious to face Alan Warburton.
His manner, as he came forward to receive her, had undergone a change, and his first words were so startlingly like those last words of Leslie’s, that Winnie’s tongue failed to furnish the prompt sarcasm usually ready to meet whatever he might choose to utter.
He was standing by a large chair as she entered the library, and moving this a trifle forward, he said simply, and with just such a gravely courteous tone as he might use in addressing a stranger:
“Be seated, Miss French.”
Winnie sank into the proffered chair, and he draws back a few paces, and standing thus before her, began:
“Not long since I asked you to listen to me, and then to decide between another and myself. I do not repeat this request, for I cannot stand before you and accuse a woman who is not here to speak in her own defence. Although I did not read that note you proffered me, I have satisfied myself that Mrs. Warburton has gone.”
“Yes,” sighed Winnie.
“She planned her flight, if flight it can be called, very skilfully. Everything in her apartments indicates deliberate preparation. She took no baggage; no one knows how or when she quitted the house. But she left two letters—two besides that written to you. One is addressed to Mr. Follingsbee; the other is for your mother.”
“Yes,” sighed Winnie once more.
“These letters,” continued Alan, “must be delivered at once, and they should not be entrusted to the hands of servants. And now, Miss French, that letter, your letter, which you proffered me in a moment of excitement, I will not ask to see. But tell me, does it give you any idea of her destination? Does it contain anything that I may know?”