"They're getting married in a fortnight," she cried harshly, accusingly.
There is no need for Louie to ask who, nor did she know what instinct again, as before, bade her take up a definite attitude without a moment's delay. She only felt in her very bones that delay would be perilous, and that not the shade of an expression must cross her face that was not natural and unsurprised.
"Yes, of course; didn't you know?" she said quietly. "Mr. Jeffries and Evie Soames, you mean?"
Again Kitty made that painful little sound—à bouche fermée. "You knew?" she cried.
A simple lie would not have availed; this was so obvious that Louie lied deliberately, circumstantially and at length.
"Yes, of course I knew. Of course I did. Do you mean to say you didn't? I made certain you did; I was going to write to you. In about a fortnight, isn't it? I'm—I'm giving them a wedding present; it's—it's that piece of crochet you saw me doing. It isn't much, but these things don't go by value; it's the intention. What are you going to give them?"
She almost blushed for the lameness of it. As a matter of fact, she had intended that piece of crochet for the new flat, when she should take it; but to soothe Kitty now was of more importance than crochet for new flats. She watched her covertly, anxiously.
"How did you know?" Kitty flashed out, again stopping in her walk.
"Sit down, dear; sit on the edge of my bed; I'm sure you're tired. How did I know? Why, I saw Evie herself. I saw her on a bus one day in Tottenham Court Road. It was near the Adam and Eve. And—I say, Kitty"—dropping her voice confidentially, she made an appeal to Kitty's hunger for gossip—anything for a diversion—"I doubt if they'll have too much to live on—it takes a tidy bit to get married on—and I don't suppose she has any shares to sell."
But Kitty did not seem to hear. She flashed out again.