“With regard to your husband and that Hare girl. You were blindly, outrageously jealous of him.”
“Go on.”
“And I say I think you are on the wrong scent. I do not believe Mr. Carlyle ever thought of the girl—in that way.”
“What do you mean?” she gasped.
“They had a secret between them—not of love—a secret of business; and those interviews they had together, her dancing attendance upon him perpetually, related to that, and that alone.”
Her face was more flushed than it had been throughout the interview. He spoke quietly now, quite in an equal tone of reasoning; it was his way when the ill-temper was upon him: and the calmer he spoke, the more cutting were his words. He need not have told her this.
“What was the secret?” she inquired, in a low tone.
“Nay, I can’t explain all; they did not take me into their confidence. They did not even take you; better, perhaps that they had though, as things have turned out, or seem to be turning. There’s some disreputable secret attaching to the Hare family, and Carlyle was acting in it, under the rose, for Mrs. Hare. She could not seek out Carlyle herself, so she sent the young lady. That’s all I know.”
“How did you know it?”
“I had reason to think so.”