“I want you to help me with your recollection of the past, Lady Lochinvar. You were at Nice seventeen years ago, I believe?”
“Between November and April, yes. I have spent those months here for the last twenty years.”
“You remember a Mr. Ransome and his wife, seventeen years ago?”
“Yes, I remember them distinctly. I cannot help remembering them.”
“Have you ever met Mr. Ransome since that time?”
“Never.”
“And you have not heard anything about him?”
“No, I have never heard of him since he left the asylum on the road to St. André. Good heavens, Mrs. Greswold, how white you have turned! Pietro, some brandy this moment—”
“No, no! I am quite well—only a little shocked, that is all. I had heard that Mr. Ransome was out of his mind at one time, but I did not believe my informant. It is really true, then? He was once mad?”
“Yes, he was mad; unless it was all a sham, a clever assumption.”