John stooped to lodge the basket on the low top of the grass-grown cliff, jutting upwards before him. But he did not answer.
"Believe me when I say that no thought of reproach on you for entertaining these opinions rests on my mind," proceeded Miss Castlemaine. "I am sure that you conscientiously hold them; that you cannot divest yourself of them; and----"
"I wish I didn't," interposed John. "I only wish I had no cause to."
"There is no cause," she said in a low tone; "no true one. I am as sure of it as that I stand here. Even had it been Mr. Castlemaine whom you saw come in here that night, I feel sure his presence could have been explained away. But I think you must have been mistaken. You have no confirmation that it was he: nay, the confirmation lies rather the other way--that he was not here. Considering all this, I think you ought not to persist in your opinion, Mr. Bent; or to let the world believe you persist in it."
"As I have said before, madam, this is a matter that I don't care to talk to you upon."
"But I wish you to talk to me. I ask you to talk to me. You may see that I speak to you confidentially--do you so speak to me. There is no one else I would thus talk with about it, save you."
"Madam, it's just this--not but what I feel the honour you do me, and thank you for it; and goodness knows what honour I hold and have always held you in, Miss Castlemaine--But it's this, ma'am: your opinion lies one way and mine the other: and while I would not insist to you that Mr. Castlemaine was guilty, I yet can't let myself say he was not."
"I am as fully persuaded he was not as that those stars are above us," she said. But John made no reply.
"Mr. Anthony was made away with, madam. I----"
"No, no," she interrupted with a shiver.