“No, don’t,” said May quietly; “not to someone who was there and saw and heard all!”
In the deep silence which followed, his quick angry breathing could be heard; then May spoke again in the same calm way.
“A woman wants also perfect confidence in her husband’s honour. It would not be pleasant to hear searching inquiries as to how bank-notes, for instance, which he had passed on to other people had come into his possession.”
The flush on Cyril’s face faded, and a grey pallor took its place. He took a backward step and almost gasped out—
“Miss Lawrence, what do you mean?”
“Nothing very much. Of course, no man of honour would mind such inquiries. But it seems that there is a hue and cry of some sort over a bank-note which my brother cashed some time ago. That note he changed for a friend of his who happened to be short of gold one day and asked him for it. It is rather wonderful he remembered the circumstance, but he did. As he said to me, that sort of thing was not quite pleasant, though no doubt everything could be satisfactorily explained.”
Cyril’s face was livid.
“I never asked your brother for change.”
“Did I say that you did?”
“It was implied in your speech.”