"
Durrance did not answer her, and she resented his silence. She knew
nothing whatever of his plans; she was unaware whether he meant to break
his engagement with Ethne or to hold her to it, and curiosity consumed
her. It might be a very long time before she saw him again, and all that
long time she must remain tortured with doubts.
"You distrust me?" she said defiantly, and with a note of anger in her
voice.
Durrance answered her quite gently:--
"Have I no reason to distrust you? Why did you tell me of Captain
Willoughby's coming? Why did you interfere?"
"I thought you ought to know."
"But Ethne wished the secret kept. I am glad to know, very glad. But,
after all, you told me, and you were Ethne's friend."
"Yours, too, I hope," Mrs. Adair answered, and she exclaimed: "How could
I go on keeping silence? Don't you understand?"
"No."
Durrance might have understood, but he had never given much thought to
Mrs. Adair, and she knew it. The knowledge rankled within her, and his
simple "no" stung her beyond bearing.
"I spoke brutally, didn't I?" she said. "I told you the truth as
brutally as I could. Doesn't that help you to understand?"
Again Durrance said "No," and the monosyllable exasperated her out of
all prudence, and all at once she found herself speaking incoherently
the things which she had thought.
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