Meg's eyes dropped; her heart beat painfully.
"He didn't," Michael said. "Don't pain yourself, dearest, by answering. He'll understand better now—everything will be made clear."
"Don't blame him, Mike!"
"I'm not blaming him—I'd have done the same. It sounded beastly, the whole story. Hang Millicent Mervill!"
Margaret proceeded to tell him in broken sentences that she had seen Millicent in Cairo, and related something of what she had told her and how, after that, she had kept the promise which she had made to Freddy, to go back to England if she heard from either Michael himself or from Millicent that they had been together in the desert.
"And you heard that she was in my camp?"
"Yes—Millicent took care that I heard that, and . . ." she paused.
Michael looked into her eyes. "And you went back England?"
"Yes, I kept my promise." Her eyes told him that she had kept it because her honour demanded it, not because she believed all that Millicent had told her.
"And, knowing her story, you didn't condemn me, you still believed in me and loved me?" His eyes thanked her.