“Maurice, you must take it to Eirene, and have it out with her at once. It mayn’t be as bad as it looks. Perhaps she will be able to say something to explain—— At any rate you must settle it with her before you speak to another creature, or things will never be right again between you.”
“That’s true. I will. And you might as well tell Wylie how it is when he comes in. He’ll have to know why I can’t stay in Emathia as we agreed to do.”
He went into Eirene’s sitting-room, and she started up to meet him, but turned white at the sight of the paper in his hand.
“What does this mean, Eirene?” he asked, laying it on the table, and she bent over it and pretended to read it, for the sake of gaining time.
“She swore on the icon to give it back to me,” she murmured at last. It was not what she had intended to say, but all the arguments that raced through her mind seemed utterly futile.
“Perhaps she agreed with me, that when one is disgraced it is as well to know it,” he replied.
“It was to save your life.”
“At the cost of honour.”
“It was the only way. I do care for your honour, Maurice, you know it, but when it was a choice between that and your life——”
“It would have been more—regular—to leave the choice to me.”