“To speak and act. Let there be plain truth between us at this interview, if there never has been before.”
“I don’t understand you.”
“Naked truth, unglossed over,” she pursued, bending her eyes determinately upon him. “It must be.”
“With all my heart,” returned Sir Francis. “It is you who have thrown out the challenge, mind.”
“When you left in July you gave me a sacred promise to come back in time for our marriage; you know what I mean when I say ‘in time,’ but—”
“Of course I meant to do so when I gave the promise,” he interrupted. “But no sooner had I set my foot in London than I found myself overwhelmed with business, and away from it I could not get. Even now I can only remain with you a couple of days, for I must hasten back to town.”
“You are breaking faith already,” she said, after hearing him calmly to the end. “Your words are not words of truth, but of deceit. You did not intend to be back in time for the marriage, or otherwise you would have caused it to take place ere you went at all.”
“What fancies you do take up!” uttered Francis Levison.
“Some time subsequent to your departure,” she quietly went on, “one of the maids was setting to rights the clothes in your dressing-closet, and she brought me a letter she found in one of the pockets. I saw by the date that it was one of those two which you received on the morning of your departure. It contained the information that the divorce was pronounced.”
She spoke so quietly, so apparently without feeling or passion, that Sir Francis was agreeably astonished. He should have less trouble in throwing off the mask. But he was an ill-tempered man; and to hear that the letter had been found to have the falseness of his fine protestations and promises laid bare, did not improve his temper now. Lady Isabel continued,—