“But that Mr. Burlingame did not like him?” The wife had a strange intuition regarding Mr. Burlingame. She was sure that there was a woman in the case--the girl beside her?
“That was because Mr. Burlingame was not kind or good to other people,” was Kitty’s sedate response. There was an undertone of reflection in the voice which did not escape Mrs. Crozier’s senses, and it also caught the ear of the Young Doctor, to whom there came a sudden revelation of the reason why Burlingame had left Mrs. Tynan’s house.
“Oh!” exclaimed Mrs. Crozier enigmatically. Presently, with suppressed excitement as she saw the Young Doctor reining in the horses slowly, she added: “My husband--when have you arranged that I should see him?”
“When he gets back--home,” Kitty replied, with an accent on the last word.
Mrs. Crozier started visibly. “When he gets back home-back from where? He is not here?” she asked in a tone of chagrin. She had come a long way, and she had pictured this meeting at the end of the journey with a hundred variations, but never with this one--that she should not see Shiel at once when the journey was over, if he was alive. Was it hurt pride or disappointed love which spoke in her face, in her words? After all, it was bad enough that her private life and affairs should be dragged out in a court of law; that these two kind strangers, whom she had never seen till a few minutes ago, should be in the inner circle of knowledge of the life of her husband and herself, without her self-esteem being hurt like this. She was very woman, and the look of the thing was not nice to her eyes, while it must belittle her in theirs. Had this girl done it on purpose? Yet why should she--she who had so appealed to her to come to him--have sought to humiliate her?
Kitty was not quite sure what she ought to say. “You see, we expected him back before this. He is very exact!”
“Very exact?” asked Mrs. Crozier in astonishment. This was a new phase of Shiel Crozier’s character. He must, indeed, have changed since he had caused her so much anxiety in days gone by.
“Usen’t he to be so?” asked Kitty, a little viciously. “He is so very exact now,” she added. “He expected to be back home before this”--how she loved to use that word home--“and so we thought he would be here when you arrived. But he has been detained at Aspen Vale. He had a big business deal on--”