“I first met Lady Meldrum at a bazaar with which I was connected in aid of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children. We held a stall together.”
“You had never met her, or known her before?”
“Never. She was the wife of a Glasgow knight, and quite unknown in London.”
“Was Muriel with her at the bazaar?”
“I did, not see her. I believe she was away visiting somewhere. Lady Meldrum spoke of her, I recollect quite distinctly.”
“And it was you who afterwards introduced her in town. I presume she owes all her social success to you?”
“Yes, I believe she does,” she replied.
“Then I consider it curious that she has never confided in you the secret of Muriel’s birth. She surely could not expect you to stand sponsor for a girl of whom you knew nothing?”
“Oh, how absurdly you talk, Dudley!” she laughed airily. “Whatever is in your mind? If Muriel Mortimer amuses you, as apparently she does, what does her parentage matter? Sir Henry and her ladyship are perfectly respectable persons, and even though they may be of somewhat plebeian origin they don’t offend by bad manners. Can it be that your thirst for knowledge is due to a vague idea that Muriel might one day be the châtelaine of this place, eh?”
She looked him full in the face with the dark and brilliant eyes that had always held him spellbound. She was a clever woman, and with feminine intuition knew exactly the power she possessed over the man whom she loved with a passion so fierce and uncurbed that she had been led to overstep the conventionalities.