“Pleeease.”
“Must I?” He raised feeble hands.
“Of course, you silly person, I don’t really mean ‘everything.’ How could I when you’re so tired, so awfully tired! But you come here all strange and mysterious and dramatic and simply tell us that Archie’s all right. How can one help being curious? Why is he all right? Have you only persuaded them that he didn’t do it? Or have you shown them the person that really did?”
“The second,” Anthony said, covertly feasting his eyes.
“Who? Who?” She had risen in her excitement.
Anthony looked up at her, and looking, forgot the question.
She stamped her foot. “Oh, you irritating man!” she cried, and shook him by the shoulder. “Tell me at once!”
“It was—Digby-Coates,” said Anthony slowly, fearing the news might affect her deeply.
She took that in silence. Whether astonishment or other emotions had affected her he could not at the moment discern. Her next words told him.
“I suppose”—her tone was thoughtful—“that I ought to be surprised. And horrified. But somehow I’m not. I don’t mean, you know, that I ever suspected him or anything like that. But I’m just not awfully surprised, that’s all.”