Isabel flushed angrily at the remembrance.
“No, indeed, I should not dare trust Brown; and then you forget you have not given your instructions concerning the bell, which was to be made at the village florists, as there were not japonicas enough in the greenhouse here,” Isabel said, catching at this device for getting him away. “Besides,” she added, “this is only a business call, you know.”
He began to notice her anxiety in spite of her forced composure, and with a searching look into her face he replied, as he turned away:
“True, I had almost forgotten about that. I will attend to your commissions at once.”
She told him to wait one moment while she procured a piece of silk to match the gloves by; and he stood there with bent head and contracted brow until she returned with it, and then, without a word, he passed out toward the stables.
The guilty girl then sped back again to her room as if on wings to bring the casket, anxious to have everything settled, and those wretched marplots out of the way before his return.
As she re-entered the drawing-room she saw at a glance that her mother was very much disconcerted about something, and she heard Adrian say, sternly:
“Then, madam, you still assert that you were very much surprised, as well as distressed, at Miss Douglas’ disappearance?”
“Certainly; how could it be otherwise?” she demanded, haughtily, but very pale.
“Were you a man,” he returned, with biting scorn in his tones, “I should not thus privately bandy words with you—you should answer publicly for what you have done; and it is time your complicity in this matter be exposed.”