“I refuse to discuss it with you. Now I am going to bed, for I am tired,” Lady Mildred said coldly and immediately she left the room.
But alone, her composure vanished, and she threw herself on to the bed, sobbing bitterly, and it was many hours before she fell asleep, worn out in mind and body. When morning came she was once more calm, and her manner was cold and forbidding when she met her sister.
“I absolutely refuse to discuss my husband with you,” she said to her, “and if you persist in doing so, you must leave here.”
“It is for your own good, Mildred, for I hate to see you spoiling your life. Read this morning’s paper and you will see that John’s counsel denied that John took away the native woman from the man he shot except to save her torture. You will say that John was quite right in shooting the brute who could torture a woman in the way Marillier did. Don’t you see that this charge is only trumped up by the Baron to force John to silence? If I were in your place, I would be by my husband’s side, and help him to defeat his enemy,” Lady Ethel cried vehemently.
Lady Mildred had seized the newspaper and was eagerly reading the full account given of the proceedings at Bow Street.
A perusal of Sir Richard’s speech made her doubt for the first time that she had acted wisely in leaving her husband. But pride quickly banished the doubt, for she could imagine her friends commenting on the charge.
“It is an easy matter to deny its truth, for John could do nothing else,” she told herself.
It was not merely this accusation that distressed her for there was also the fact that all this scandal might have been avoided by his giving a simple promise to the Baron. And he had refused to do this, even when she had appealed to him so passionately.
The days passed slowly, and as each morning came, Lady Ethel hoped that her sister would have relented, but there was no sign of any change; so, when a week had gone, she rose early and drove straight to London, without leaving word where she had gone. It was twelve o’clock when she reached Park Lane, only to find that there was no one in the house except the servants. However, she decided to wait Gaunt’s return, and she went to her room to prepare for lunch. As she passed her brother-in-law’s room she chanced to glance through the open door, and to her surprise noticed many trunks lying around, all of which were strapped.
“Can he be going away?” she asked herself.