"But—but—" stammered Sybil, crimson, "the vicar says that all Major Otis tells him is borne out by his own knowledge, only the real facts were kept from him by Mr. Mayne. The Major says he is prepared to swear before any magistrate that all he says is true."
"Then he has actually presumed to make charges against Miss Lutwyche?" asked the Captain, his eyes like blue fire. "You can tell him from me that wilful perjury's a serious matter in England."
"Oh, Captain Brooke, do you really think that what he says about Miss Lutwyche is untrue? Because the vicar is gone to lay the matter before Sir Joseph. He felt it his duty. Major Otis says Miss Lutwyche, if asked, can't, and won't deny it."
"Deny what?" asked Brooke, in a tone that, as Sybil afterwards declared, sent cold shivers down her back.
"If—if it's true, Miss Lutwyche ought not— But I couldn't possibly tell you!"
"Yet you could listen," he broke in. "You could stand by while that coward dared to mishandle the name of a girl you have known for years! You could believe his vile accusations! Well, now, he has chosen to do this thing in public, and I'll make him regret it to the last day he lives. I'll just trouble Major Otis to repeat his lies to me! Excuse plain speaking. But I know this man, and you don't."
The Burmester party, including the vicar and the Helstons, were just driving away as he strode with his long, firm stride, across the field to where the Major stood, a cluster of eager listeners around him. His hand rested on the shoulder of a big, slouching boy, swarthy, with high cheek-bones and little black eyes, who seemed about as unlike what one would imagine Melicent's brother as anything could be.
"This boy can tell you it's all true," he was saying, "and so could Mestaer, if he hadn't got shot as a spy later on, in the campaign."
"I knew Mestaer," said the Captain, in a carrying voice. "Perhaps the fact may serve as an introduction between us, Major. Now you tell me, straight out, the truth about him and Miss Lutwyche, just as you have been telling these friends of ours, will you?"
Eager faces, wearing expressions of various kinds, pressed nearer as Otis, wholly unsuspicious, repeated his version of Millie's flight from her father's house.