"Oh, my dear, how _dreadful_" Mrs. Frayling exclaimed. "I am sure you
are quite mistaken. You don't understand him at all."

Mr. Frayling shrugged his shoulders and snorted. He despised feminine
conclusions too much to reply to them, but not nearly enough to be wholly
unmoved by them.

Mrs. Frayling spent the three days in sitting still, embroidering silk
flowers on a satin ground, and watering them well with her tears. But on
the morning of the fourth day, by the first post, letters arrived which
put an end to their suspense. One was from Mrs. Orton Beg and the other
from Evadne herself. Mrs. Frayling read them aloud at the breakfast table,
and the three sat for an hour in solemn conclave, considering them.

Mrs. Orton Beg had had time to recover herself and reflect before she
wrote, and the consequence was some modification of her first impression.

"MY DEAR ELIZABETH:

"Evadne is here; she arrived this afternoon. On her wedding day she
received a letter from a lady, whose name I am not allowed to mention
here, but written under the impression that Evadne was being kept in
ignorance of Major Colquhoun's past life, and offering to give her any
information that had been withheld so that she might not be blindly
entrapped into marrying him under the delusion that he was a worthy man.
The letter arrived too late, but Evadne went off nevertheless on the spur
of the moment to make further inquiries, the result of which is great
indignation on her part for having been allowed to marry a man of such
antecedents, and a determination not to live with him. She wishes to stay