"Particularly in Brighton.... You never do, do you?"

"No, mamma."

"Good-night."

The stepmother left the room. Mimi could feel her heart beating. Then
Jean called out:

"Mimi."

She made no reply. The fact was she was too disturbed to be able to
reply.

Jean called again and then got out of bed and thudded across the room to
her bedside.

"I say, Mimi," he screeched in his insistent treble, "who _was_ it you
were talking to?"

Mimi's heart did not beat, it jumped.

"When? Where?"

"This afternoon, when I was having my hair cut."

"How do you know I was talking to anybody?"

"Ada saw you through the window of the barber's."