"For me?"
"Well—it would have spared you some painful explanations." Sarah felt herself sincere. She really desired to spare Mrs. Majendie. The part which she had rehearsed with such ease in her own bedroom was impossible in Mrs. Majendie's drawing-room. She was charmed by the spirit of the place, constrained by its suggestion of fair observances, high decencies, and social suavities. She could not sit there and tell Mrs. Majendie that her husband had been unfaithful to her. You do not say these things. And so subdued was Sarah that she found a certain relief in the reflection that, by clearing herself, she would clear Majendie.
"I don't in the least know what you want to say to me," said Mrs. Majendie. "But I would rather take everything for granted than have any explanations."
"If I thought you would take my innocence for granted—"
"Your innocence? I should be a bad judge of it, Lady Cayley."
"Quite so." Lady Cayley smiled again, and again inimitably. (It was extraordinary, the things she took for granted.) "That's why I've come to explain."
"One moment. Perhaps I am mistaken. But, if you are referring to—to what happened in the past, there need be no explanation. I have put all that out of my mind now. I have heard that you, too, have left it far behind you; and I am willing to believe it. There is nothing more to be said."
There was such a sweetness and dignity in Mrs. Majendie's voice and manner that Lady Cayley was further moved to compete in dignity and sweetness. She suppressed the smile that ignored so much and took so much for granted.
"Unfortunately a great deal more has been said. Your husband is an intimate friend of my sister, Mrs. Ransome, as of course you know."
Mrs. Majendie's face denied all knowledge of the intimacy.