‘In the register? What—what do you mean?’
‘Mamma, I mean that Mrs. Blencarrow is married—to somebody else. She’s been married these three years. I read her name this very day. It’s in the register at Gretna Green.’
Mrs. Bircham staggered back a few steps and dropped into a chair.
‘Married!’ she cried. ‘Mrs. Blencarrow married!’
‘Three years ago,’ cried Kitty glibly. ‘Fifth January—I saw the date—three years ago!’
Mrs. Bircham sat with her hands clasped and her eyes glaring, ‘as if,’ Kitty said afterwards, ‘they would come out of her head.’ She uttered a succession of cries, from little shrieks to breathless exclamations. ‘Married!—Mrs. Blencarrow! Oh, oh, Kitty! Oh, good heavens!—Mrs. Blencarrow! Three years ago—the time she went off to Scotland to see her sister. Oh, oh, Kitty! In the register! Get me a glass of water, or I think I shall die.’
Walter disappeared for the water, thinking that after all his mother-in-law was a good-hearted woman, and didn’t feel as Kitty said she would; but when he returned, his admiration of Mrs. Bircham turned into admiration for his wife, for Kitty and her mother, sitting close as if they were the dearest friends, were laying their heads together and talking both at the same time; and the horror and amazement in Mrs. Bircham’s face had given way to the dancing of a malicious light in her eyes, and a thrill of eagerness all over her.
‘I am not at all surprised,’ she was saying when Walter came in. ‘I felt sure something of the kind would come to light sooner or later. I never would have trusted her—not a step beyond what I saw. I felt sure all wasn’t right in that house. What a mercy, Kitty, that you saw it!’
‘Wasn’t it a mercy, mamma!’
Kitty gave her young husband a look aside; she had made her peace with her news. But Mrs. Bircham thought of nothing—neither of her daughter’s escapade, nor her own just anger—of nothing but this wonderful news, and what would be the best thing to do.