"Oh, he did--several. He made out that I was everything that was bad."
"There you are--that's the kind of man he was."
"But didn't he say something about a policeman--and giving you in charge?"
"I am sure that he would have given me in charge to twenty policemen if he could, and that nothing would have pleased him better than to have had me sent to penal servitude for life."
"What I can't make out is--why did he dislike you so?"
"My dear, I'm afraid the explanation is simple--too simple. I don't want to hurt your feelings, but I've a notion--a very strong one--that he didn't like you. He regarded you as a nuisance; you know how he kept you in the background as long as he could; you interfered with the sort of life he liked to live; you were in his way."
"He certainly never at any period of his life or mine, showed himself over-anxious for my company."
"When you did become installed in town, he had formed his own plans for your future. What precisely was the arrangement between them I don't pretend to know; but I dare say I shall find out before long--it won't need much to induce Wilkes to give himself away; but I am persuaded that it was his intention that you should become Mrs. Stephen Wilkes."
"But what makes you think so? It seems to me so monstrous. Fancy me as Mrs. Stephen Wilkes!"
"Thank you, I'd rather not. It's only a case of intuition, I admit, but I'm convinced I'm right, and one day I may be able to give you chapter and verse. He was not over-fond of me to begin with, but when you appeared on the scene, and he saw that his best laid plans bade fair to gang agley, he suddenly began to develop a feeling towards me which ended as it has done. It's not a pretty one, but there's my explanation. But, sweetheart, that page is ended; let's turn it over and never look back at it; and all the rest of the volume--let's try our best to make it happy reading."