"Couldn't learn any of the particulars, only that he took his wife from a gentleman's arm in a rude kind of way, and left the party."
"Oh! that accounts for their not coming home in a carriage," broke in one of the listeners.
"Perhaps so. But who said they didn't ride home?"
"Mr. Craig. He and Mrs. Craig saw them as they came to the door, covered with snow. They were walking."
"Oh, you were at the party, Mr. Craig? Did you see or hear anything about this affair?"
"Nothing," replied Mr. Craig. "If there had been any trouble, I should most likely have heard something of it."
"I had my information from a gentleman who was there," said the other.
"I don't question that," replied Mr. Craig. "A trifling incident but half understood will often give rise to exaggerated reports—so exaggerated that but little of the original truth remains in them. The general may have done something under the excitement of wine that gave color to the story now in circulation. I think that very possible. But I don't believe the affair to be half so bad as represented."
While this conversation was going on Mrs. Abercrombie sat alone in her room. She had walked the floor restlessly as the time drew near for the general's return, but after the hour went by, and there was no sign of his coming, all the life seemed to go out of her. She was sitting now, or rather crouching down, in a large cushioned chair, her face white and still and her eyes fixed in a kind of frightened stare.
Time passed, but she remained so motionless that but for her wide-open eyes you would have thought her asleep or dead.