“Kindly telegraph your Whitby address to me,” he said to Hume. Then he walked to the door, leaving them brusquely.
For once in his career he was deeply annoyed.
“Confound all women!” he muttered in anger. “They nurse some petty little secret, some childish love affair, and deem its preservation more important than their own happiness, or the lives of their best friends. They are all alike—duchess or scullery-maid. Their fluttering hearts are all the world to them, and everything else chaos. If that woman only chose—”
“Mr. Brett!” came a clear voice along the corridor.
It was Margaret. She came to him hastily
“Why do you suspect me?” she exclaimed brokenly. “I am the most miserable woman on earth. Suffering and death environ me, and overwhelm those nearest and dearest. Yet what have I done that you should think me capable of concealing from you material facts which would be of use to you?”
The barrister was tempted to retort that what she believed to be “material” might indeed be of very slight service to him, but the contrary proposition held good, too.
Then he saw the anguish in her face, and it moved him to say gently:
“Go back to your friends, Mrs. Capella. I am not the keeper of your conscience. I am almost sure you are worrying yourself about trifles. Whatever they may be, you are not responsible. Rest assured of this, in a few days much that is now dim and troublous will be cleared up. I ask you nothing further. I would prefer not to hear anything you wish to say to me. It might fetter my hands Good-bye!”