“But I saw him,” said Mrs. Eastwood, “he was most distinct in what he said to me—more medical than I could understand—but very clear. He said he had expected it for years, that Mr. Batty knew—that you even had been told——”
“Yes, yes, I know,” said Frederick, “that was all very well. Her heart was affected; and very fortunate it is for us that such an idea existed. But, mother, Amanda, poor girl, has been in a much greater passion with me than she ever could have been with Innocent, and did not die. Why did she die just then, with no one else present, and with this business about the opiate? I wish you would throw that little bottle into the fire. It is the sort of thing which would affect a stupid juryman more than evidence.”
“Oh, Frederick!” said Mrs. Eastwood, trembling and crying; “for God’s sake, don’t talk as if it could ever come to that.”
“Why shouldn’t it come to that? If Batty once gets hold of the story, he will not let it rest, I promise you. He knows I hate him, and have always done so, and he would believe it. Unfortunately, poor Amanda was aware of Innocent’s feeling for me.”
“Frederick,” said Mrs. Eastwood, “Innocent, I am sure, had no feeling for you that an innocent girl might not have for her first friend, her protector, her relation——”
Mrs. Eastwood was not so sure of this as she professed to be, and the want of certainty showed itself in her voice. And Frederick was convinced to the contrary, and felt that he was right, whatever any one might say.
“You did not always think so, mother,” he said. “I wish with all my heart it had not been so—but you must see that this feeling on Innocent’s part changes at once the whole character of the story. It gives it a motive, it makes it possible. A girl would not do such a thing for nothing; but the moment you supply the motive——”
“Frederick, for heaven’s sake! you speak not only as if she had done it, but as if she had meant to do it——”
“I speak as Batty would think, and as his lawyer would put it,” said Frederick, with sombre certainty. “The best thing we could do, mother, would be to send her away. If she were taken to some out-of-the-way place—in Italy, perhaps, as she knows Italy——”
“I cannot give up my poor child’s cause like this,” cried his mother. “Send her away as if she were guilty—banish her from her home——”