“No, sir! Helena.”
“No, madam! Eunice.”
“What does he mean?” said Miss Jillgall to herself.
I heard her. “This is what I mean,” I asserted, in my most positive manner. “The only subject on which the Minister has consulted me is Miss Eunice’s marriage.”
My tone left her no alternative but to believe me. She looked not only bewildered, but alarmed. “Oh, poor man, has he lost himself in such a dreadful way as that?” she said to herself. “I daren’t believe it!” She turned to me. “You have been talking with him for some time. Please try to remember. While Mr. Gracedieu was speaking of Euneece, did he say nothing of Helena’s infamous conduct to her sister?”
Not the slightest hint of any such thing, I assured her, had reached my ears.
“Then,” she cried, “I can tell you what he has forgotten! We kept as much of that miserable story to ourselves as we could, in mercy to him. Besides, he was always fondest of Euneece; she would live in his memory when he had forgotten the other—the wretch, the traitress, the plotter, the fiend!” Miss Jillgall’s good manners slipped, as it were, from under her; she clinched her fists as a final means of expressing her sentiments. “The wretched English language isn’t half strong enough for me,” she declared with a look of fury.
I took a liberty. “May I ask what Miss Helena has done?” I said.
“May you ask? Oh, Heavens! you must ask, you shall ask. Mr. Governor, if your eyes are not opened to Helena’s true character, I can tell you what she will do; she will deceive you into taking her part. Do you think she went to the station out of regard for the great man? Pooh! she went with an eye to her own interests; and she means to make the great man useful. Thank God, I can stop that!”
She checked herself there, and looked suspiciously at the door of Mr. Gracedieu’s room.