"Would you visit Jane Beaufort?"
"Yes, if I believed her innocent of what the world charges against her."
"You are aware, then, that Mrs. Lloyd and Jane Beaufort are the same person?"
"No, sir, I am not aware of any such thing."
"It is true."
"I do not believe it. Mrs. Lloyd I have known intimately for over two years, and can verify her character."
"I am sorry for you, then, for a viler character it would be difficult to find outside the haunts of infamy," said Emerson.
Contempt and anger were suddenly blended in his manner.
"I cannot hear one to whom I am warmly attached thus assailed. You must not speak in that style of my friends, Hartley Emerson!"
"Your friends!" There was a look of intense scorn on his face. "Precious friends, if she represent them, truly! Major Willard is another, mayhap?"