The steward started back as he might have started back from a loaded pistol leveled at his head. His eyes glared as if he had suddenly lost his senses, and the nervous trembling to which he was subject shook him from head to foot.
“What’s the matter?” said Midwinter. There was no answer. “What is there so very startling,” he went on, a little impatiently, “in Miss Gwilt’s being my wife?”
“Your wife?” repeated Mr. Bashwood, helplessly. “Mrs. Armadale—!” He checked himself by a desperate effort, and said no more.
The stupor of astonishment which possessed the steward was instantly reflected in Midwinter’s face. The name in which he had secretly married his wife had passed the lips of the last man in the world whom he would have dreamed of admitting into his confidence! He took Mr. Bashwood by the arm, and led him away to a quieter part of the terminus than the part of it in which they had hitherto spoken to each other.
“You referred to my wife just now,” he said; “and you spoke of Mrs. Armadale in the same breath. What do you mean by that?”
Again there was no answer. Utterly incapable of understanding more than that he had involved himself in some serious complication which was a complete mystery to him, Mr. Bashwood struggled to extricate himself from the grasp that was laid on him, and struggled in vain.
Midwinter sternly repeated the question. “I ask you again,” he said, “what do you mean by it?”
“Nothing, sir! I give you my word of honor, I meant nothing!” He felt the hand on his arm tightening its grasp; he saw, even in the obscurity of the remote corner in which they stood, that Midwinter’s fiery temper was rising, and was not to be trifled with. The extremity of his danger inspired him with the one ready capacity that a timid man possesses when he is compelled by main force to face an emergency—the capacity to lie. “I only meant to say, sir,” he burst out, with a desperate effort to look and speak confidently, “that Mr. Armadale would be surprised—”
“You said Mrs. Armadale!”
“No, sir—on my word of honor, on my sacred word of honor, you are mistaken—you are, indeed! I said Mr. Armadale—how could I say anything else? Please to let me go, sir—I’m pressed for time. I do assure you I’m dreadfully pressed for time!”