"He don't deserve it from me. I've known him to do unhandsome things. Mean!"
"Winthrop Landholm! — My dear Mrs. Haye, you are under some misapprehension. I'll stake my reputation he never did an unhandsome or a mean thing. He couldn't."
"He did," said Rose.
"Will you favour me with the particulars you have heard?"
"I haven't heard," said Rose, — "I know."
"You have heard!" said Elizabeth sternly, — "and only heard.
You forget. You may not have understood anything right."
The gentleman looked in a little astonishment from the bright- coloured cheeks of one lady to the cloudy brow of the other; but as neither added anything further, he took up the matter.
"I am almost certain Miss Elizabeth is right. I am sure Mr. Landholm would not do what you suspect him of. He could not do it."
"He is mortal, I suppose," said Rose sourly, "and so he would do what other mortals do."
"He is better than some other mortals," said Mr. Satterthwaite. "I am not a religious man myself; but if anything would make me believe in it, it would be that man."