“Well, what?”
“You would have slipped out and carried Helen with you—wouldn't you?”
The ladies were silent.
“What would be your object and intention?”
“Well, what?”
“To keep me from finding out your guilt; to beguile me to infer that Margaret's excitement proceeded from some cause not known to you. In a word, to tell me a lie—a silent lie. Moreover, a possibly harmful one.”
The twins colored, but did not speak.
“You not only tell myriads of silent lies, but you tell lies with your mouths—you two.”
“That is not so!”
“It is so. But only harmless ones. You never dream of uttering a harmful one. Do you know that that is a concession—and a confession?”