"Connected with her husband ?" he asked.
Lady Myrie entered a protest.

She was a widow; and it was notorious among her friends that the death of her husband had been the happiest event in her married life.

But she understood her duty to herself as a respectable woman.
"I think, Mr.Romsey, you might have spared that cruel allusion," she said with dignity.
Mr.Romsey apologized.

He had his reasons for wishing to know something more about Mrs.Norman; he proposed to withdraw his last remark, and to put his inquiries under another form.

Might he ask his wife if anybody had seen _Mr._ Norman?
"No." "Or heard of him ?" Mrs.Romsey answered in the negative once more, and added a question on her own account.