“I have changed my plans,” he retorted curtly, and that was all he would say on the subject.
Evelyn left the table at the earliest moment. When too late, she regretted the impulse that led her to declare open war against Mrs. Laing. But it was done now. Those words “theft” and “steal” were irrevocable. She had retreated to a nook in the garden where a dense clump of tropical trees and shrubs gave shelter from the sun, and was trying to discover if she had imperilled the success of Warden’s mission by any unguarded phrase, when Lord Fairholme came to her.
“May I sit down here a few minutes?” he asked. “I want to try to understand things.”
“I should be sorry to test your lordship’s capacity so greatly,” she said. She had not yet forgiven him for not taking her part. She was young; her world was tumbling about her ears; she believed that everybody ought to stand aghast at Rosamund’s wickedness.
“Oh, come now, that’s a bit severe, isn’t it?” grinned Fairholme. “You don’t make allowances for the ruffled feelin’s of a poor fellow who has just had his image battered——”
“Will you please tell me what you are talking about?”
“Eh—beg pardon, I meant idol shattered. Silly mistake, eh, what?”
Evelyn’s lips relaxed in a smile. There was no resisting “Billy” when (in his own phrase) he was goin’ strong.
“I fear you all thought me very rude,” she said, with a pathetic little gesture of helplessness. “But what was I to do?—listen in silence to fresh insults?”
“I think you did the only possible thing.”