“I told you she was married when she was only seventeen.”
“But he—Lord Francis—he is alive?”
“Very much so! At least he looked alive enough when I saw him about half an hour ago.”
“He is here?”
“Yes. Look here, Jacynth; just let us take a turn somewhere; here, this is a quiet path, and——”
“No; not there!” said Jacynth, drawing back roughly, as Lord Castleton laid his hand on his arm. It was the pathway where he had just been speaking with Fenella. “I don’t know why I should listen to you at all. What does it matter? Nothing you can say will do any good.”
Nevertheless, he did listen. What man would not have listened? That he should believe it when it was told was another matter. Jacynth was a clever man, a man of brilliant talents and rising reputation in his profession. He had also certain special gifts which were not so generally recognized. He had a keen and almost intuitive insight into character, and a steady power of incredulity as to a vast proportion of the stories circulated in the “best society” on the “best authority.”
At first sight this may seem no very extraordinary power. And perhaps it is not extraordinary, but it is certainly not common. The gossip of the smoking room, the little tattle of the clubs, penetrate, as a fine drizzling rain penetrates one’s clothing, into the consciousness of most men.
Men may declare that they give no heed to that sort of gossip; but, as a rule, their minds are porous, and do not resist it. With persons who pride themselves on knowing the world, credulity has almost come to signify believing good of men’s neighbors. But Jacynth had often been cynically amused by the childish credulity with which a knot of men at his club would swallow evil stories, intrinsically improbable, and supported by no tittle of evidence that he would have dared to offer to the least enlightened of juries, merely because they were evil. For these gentlemen “knew the world.” Something he dimly remembered hearing of the separation which had taken place between Lord and Lady Francis Onslow; but nothing clearly. He had not lived in their world; he did not now live in it.
He had a poor opinion of Lord Castleton’s intellect, but he believed him to be as truthful as he knew how to be. Jacynth was quite capable of disbelieving a story against a woman, even though she were young, beautiful, full of impulsive high spirit, and separated from her husband, and even although he had not happened to be in love with her. He did not intend to break a lance on her behalf. He was not given to such breaking of lances, for he also “knew the world.” But neither was he going to accept Lord Castleton’s statements with the undoubting faith that Lord Castleton seemed to expect. Nevertheless he listened.