May I ask if her talk this evening at all related to a family not a hundred miles away from Maplehurst ?' His voice sounded hard and satirical in the darkness.

'I wish you would not ask me such a question, Mr.Hamilton,' I returned, much distressed.
'It was not my fault: I did not wish--' But he interrupted me.
'Of course; I knew it.

When am I ever deceived by a face or manner?
Not by yours, certainly.

So my good old friend told you about that miserable affair.

I wish she had held her tongue a little longer.