A vague sense of something wrong began to stir uneasily in Turlington’s mind.
“Don’t let me hurry you,” he said, “but if you really have anything to tell me—”
Miss Amelia summoned her courage, and began.
“We have something very dreadful to tell you,” she said, interrupting him. “You have been presented in this house, Mr. Turlington, as a gentleman engaged to marry Lady Winwood’s cousin. Miss Natalie Graybrooke.” She paused there—at the outset of the disclosure. A sudden change of expression passed over Turlington’s face, which daunted her for the moment. “We have hitherto understood,” she went on, “that you were to be married to that young lady early in next month.”
“Well?”
He could say that one word. Looking at their pale faces, and their eager eyes, he could say no more.
“Take care!” whispered Dorothea, in her sister’s ear. “Look at him, Amelia! Not too soon.”
Amelia went on more carefully.
“We have just returned from a musical meeting,” she said. “One of the ladies there was an acquaintance, a former school-fellow of ours. She is the wife of the rector of St. Columb Major—a large church, far from this—at the East End of London.”
“I know nothing about the woman or the church,” interposed Turlington, sternly.