"Are you going in the country?"
"For when she comes back, I should have said."
"Ah—but when will that be? Next come strawberry-time, perhaps! I'll write to her."
"I can't give her address." Aunt M'riar had an impression that the omission of "you" after "give" just saved her telling a lie here. Her words might have meant: "I am not at liberty to give her address to anyone." It was less like saying she did not know it.
His next words startled her. "I know her address. Got it written down here. Some swell's house in Rocestershire." He made a pretence of searching among papers.
Aunt M'riar was so taken by surprise at this that she had said "Yes—Ancester Towers" before she knew it. She was not a person to entrust secrets to.
"Right you are, mistress! Ancester Towers it is." He was making a pretence, entirely for his own satisfaction, of confirming this from a memorandum. Mr. Wix had got what he wanted, but he enjoyed the success of his ruse. Of course, he had only used what he had just overheard from Uncle Moses.
The thought then crossed Aunt M'riar's mind that unless she inquired of him who he was, or why he wanted Mrs. Prichard, he would guess that she knew already. It was the reaction of her concealed knowledge—a sort of innocent guilty conscience. It was not a reasonable thought, but a vivid one for all that—vivid enough to make her say:—"Who shall I say asked for her?"
"Any name you like. It don't matter to me. I shall write to her myself."
Guilty consciences—even innocent ones—can never leave well alone. The murderer who has buried his victim must needs hang about the spot to be sure no one is digging him up. One looks back into the room one lit a match in, to see that it is not on fire. A diseased wish to clear herself from any suspicion of knowing anything about her visitor, impelled Aunt M'riar to say:—"Of course I don't know the name you go by." Obviously she would have done well to let it alone.