"You oughtn't to abuse James to me," Lucy said, not very stoutly; "I don't abuse Laurence."
"Abuse him!" cried Mabel. "Good Heavens, child, I only say out loud what you are saying to yourself all day. We may as well know where we are." Then came a pause; and then, "I suppose you and Jimmy Urquhart are in a mess."
Lucy said nothing; whereupon Mabel showed her clear sight. "And I suppose you know now who turned the light off." At that terrible surmise Lucy got up and stood above her sister. "Mabel, I don't know what to do."
"I am sure you don't," said Mabel. "On the other hand, you know what you have to do."
"Yes," Lucy replied; "but it isn't so easy as you would think. You see, I have never spoken to him about it, nor he to me; and it seems almost impossible to begin—now."
Mabel was out of her depth. "Do you mean—? What do you really mean?"
"I mean exactly what I say. I found out the truth, by a kind of accident—one day. It wasn't possible to doubt. Well, then—it went on, you know—"
"Of course it did," said Mabel. "Well?"
—"And there was no disguise about it, after there couldn't be."
"Why should there be, if there couldn't be?" Mabel was at her wits' end.