Mrs. Eliott led him to a secluded sofa. "If you'll sit here," said she, "we can leave Johnson to entertain Miss Proctor."
"I am perplexed and distressed," said the Canon, "about our dear Mrs. Majendie."
Mrs. Eliott's eyes darkened with anxiety. She clasped her hands. "Oh why? What is it? Do you mean about the dear little girl?"
"I know nothing about the little girl. But I hear very unpleasant things about her husband."
"What things?"
The Canon's face was reticent and grim. He wished Mrs. Eliott to understand that he was no unscrupulous purveyor of gossip; that if he spoke, it was under constraint and severe necessity.
"I do not," said the Canon, "usually give heed to disagreeable reports. But I am afraid that, where there is such a dense cloud of smoke, there must be some fire."
"I think," said Mrs. Eliott, "perhaps they didn't get on very well together once. But they seem to have made it up after the sister's death. She has been happier these last three years. She has been a different woman."
"The same woman, my dear lady, the same woman. Only a better saint. For the last three years, they say, he has been living with another woman."
"Oh—it's impossible. Impossible. He is away a great deal—but—"