"Where?"
"At your hotel at Grasmere."
"At Grasmere? At the Easedale?"
Dorothea nodded.
"Go on," he prompted steadily.
"It was last August," said Dorothea. "She was in the service of a Mrs. Trent—"
She stopped. She could feel the sudden increase of tension. "Ah, I thought from your tone I'd been doing something reprehensible," said Gardiner, with a dry laugh. "Go on. I suppose she's told you a pretty yarn. I'm a murderer—is that it?"
"Oh, no, no! it's only that she says the whole truth didn't come out at the inquest. She says you—you threw something at him—a chisel—Mrs. Trent picked it up afterwards—no, please wait a moment till I've done! Louisa says too—I made her tell—that he, the man who died, had a temper, that he very likely said the most horrid things. I don't think even she thinks you were much to blame, while of course I—But she did think I ought to know; and I think so too. So I want you to tell me the very truth. Did you do it?"
Gardiner met her pleading glance, and a confession rose to his lips. Then—whether he caught some shade of expression which was not wholly innocent: whether the truth was that at heart he really trusted no one save Denis and his father—he temporized.
"Why do you want to know?"