As soon as we left the table, Mr. Tabor suggested that his wife was very tired, and that she should be off to bed. She agreed reluctantly enough only when Lady joined her father in his importunity and said that she would go up with her. At last she rose and bade us all good night; but when she and Lady were at the very door, she turned and looked back at us. Then, of a sudden she ran lightly across the room and stooped to my ear. "I have a little secret of my own," she laughed across at her husband. Then very swiftly, and with a catch in her voice, she whispered, "They are trying to take Miriam away from me!"
CHAPTER XVI
MEAGER REVELATIONS
I glanced instinctively across at Mr. Tabor, to see if he had overheard; but he gave no sign of having done so. He stood with one broad hand slowly tightening and relaxing over the back of his chair, his eyes following unwaveringly the slight figure as it paused beyond the curtains and Lady let them fall into place, then he sat wearily down again, with a smile that did not smooth the white bristle of his brows.
"That shows how tired Mrs. Tabor is," he said casually. "I never knew her to confuse the names in that way before."
My first shock changed unreasonably into the feeling of a suspected conspirator. I was sure that he had not heard; his reference was only to his wife's calling Lady "Miriam," not to her whispered words; but what could those words mean? Where was Miriam? And if this house were in some way divided against itself, on what side was I? Then I became suddenly conscious of my silence.
"Surely there is nothing at all strange in that," I answered. "For a mother to call her children by one another's names is the commonest thing in the world; especially when—" I stopped, wondering whether I were quite sure that Miriam was dead.
"Yes, natural enough, of course." He spoke absently; then went on as if answering my thought; "And then, Mrs. Tabor was greatly shaken by our first daughter's death: so much so that she has never quite recovered herself physically. Sometimes, even now, she hardly realizes, I think, that Miriam is not here." He looked down at his hand, then raised his eyes steadily to mine.
"That was several years ago?" I said, to say something.