Too late to weigh his words he remembered the name that the girl whom he had called Violet had signed to her affidavit. Before that recollection was clear to him, he made his reply in the deceit that is the refuge of all the confused.
"I never did."
"You are sure?"
"Absolutely";—he had to keep it up now—"although, if she is the sort of woman she says she is, she probably has as many aliases as a safe-cracker."
"But this girl—I should think you would not forget her if you had ever known her: she must have been good-looking once. She has blue eyes and brown hair. You could see from her face that she has suffered, but you could see that she used to be almost beautiful. She has the walk of a queen."
"I don't know her."
"Think."—Marian was still intent upon certainty.—"When I saw her she was both times dressed alike, though on her second visit her clothes, first new, had grown a little shabby. She wore a cloak—I forget its color, but it was dark—and a beaver hat. She——"
He knew those clothes; he had reason to; but his interruption was in strict accord with his previous denial:
"There are thousands of women answering that vague description. I am sure, however, that I don't know this one."
Marian did not observe that, on his own showing, his assurance was without foundation. Her words had brought Mary vividly before her and, for a minute, she well-nigh forgot her own distress in the misery of that figure.