The Duchessa shook her head.
“Darling,” said Trix again, and she slipped her arm through Pia’s.
“I’m all one big bruise,” said Pia suddenly.
Trix stroked her hand.
“It is entirely foolish of me to care,” said the Duchessa slowly. “But I happen to have trusted someone rather implicitly. I never dreamed it possible the person could stoop to act a lie. I would not have minded the thing itself,—it would have been absurd for me to have done so. But it hurt rather considerably that the person should have deceived me in the matter, in fact have acted a deliberate lie about it. I am honestly doing my best to forget the whole thing, but I am being constantly reminded of it.”
Trix sat up very straight. So that was it, she told herself. How idiotic of her not to have guessed at once,—days ago, that is,—when she herself had made her marvellous discovery. It was now quite plain to her mind that Pia must have made it too. It was Doctor Hilary whom she believed to be the fraud, the friend whom she had trusted, and who had acted a lie. The whole oddness of Pia’s behaviour became suddenly perfectly clear to her. Tibby had told her that it had begun on her return to Woodleigh. Well, that must have been when she first found out. How she’d found out, Trix didn’t know. But that was beside the mark. She evidently had found out.
Trix’s mind ran back over various little incidents. She remembered the snub administered to Father Dormer the evening after her arrival. The new under-gardener had been the subject of conversation then, of course reminding Pia of the Hall. And she had snubbed Father Dormer, as she had snubbed Doctor Hilary a few minutes ago. All Pia’s snubs and sudden prickles came back to her mind. They all had their origin in some inadvertent remark regarding the Hall.
Yes; everything was as clear as daylight now. Pia had learnt of this business in some roundabout way that did not allow of her speaking openly to Doctor Hilary on the subject, so she saw merely the fraud, and had no idea that it was, in all probability, an entirely justifiable one, and that at all events no one had told any deliberate lie. Of course Pia was disturbed and upset. Wouldn’t she have been herself, in Pia’s place? And hadn’t she felt quite unreasonably unhappy till Mr. Danver had assured her that Doctor Hilary had not spoken a single word of actual untruth?
Oh, poor Pia!
Now, it was not in the least astonishing that Trix’s mind should have leapt to this entirely erroneous conclusion. For the last fortnight it had been full of her discovery. The smallest thing that seemed to bear on it, instantly appeared actually to do so. And everything in her present train of thought fitted in with astonishing accuracy. Each little incident in Pia’s late behaviour fell into place with it.