“Perhaps it was really Lettice Lane?”
“I believe not. I am sure not. It was a lady, Miss Deveen told me that much. No; of that disgraceful act Lettice Lane was innocent: but I should never be surprised to hear of her falling into trouble. She is capable of it.”
“Of poisoning somebody, perhaps?” spoke Dr. Knox.
“Yes,” acquiesced Cattledon, grimly.
How prejudiced she was against Lettice Lane! But she had given this last answer only in the same jesting spirit in which it appeared to have been put, not really meaning it.
“To be wrongly suspected, as poor Lettice Lane was, ought to make people all the more considerate to her,” remarked Janet, her thoughts no doubt reverting to the time when she herself was falsely suspected—and accused.
“True, my dear,” answered old Tamlyn. “Poor Lettice must have had her troubles.”
“And she has had her faults,” retorted Cattledon.
But this story had made an impression on Dr. Knox that Cattledon never suspected, never intended. He took up the idea that Lettice Lane was guilty. Going into Mr. Tamlyn’s sitting-room for “Martin Chuzzlewit,” when tea was over, I found his hand on my shoulder. He had silently followed me.
“Johnny Ludlow,” he said, looking down into my eyes in the dim room, which was only lighted by the dim fire, “I don’t like this that I have heard of Lettice Lane.”