outer division of the room, but none in the inner; and for that reason,
I suppose, the curtains were drawn. The servant was very civil and
attentive to me. I have learned to be thankful for civility and
attention, and I spoke to her as cheerfully as I could. I said to her,
'I shall see Miss Garth here, as she comes up to the door, and I can
beckon her in through the long window.' The servant said I could do so,
if you came that way, but that you let yourself in sometimes with your
own key by the back-garden gate; and if you did this, she would take
care to let you know of my visit. I mention these trifles, to show you
that there was no pre-meditated deceit in my mind when I came to the
house.

"I waited a weary time, and you never came: I don't know whether my
impatience made me think so, or whether the large fire burning made the
room really as hot as I felt it to be--I only know that, after a while,
I passed through the curtains into the inner room, to try the cooler
atmosphere.

"I walked to the long window which leads into the back garden, to look
out, and almost at the same time I heard the door opened--the door of
the room I had just left, and your voice and the voice of some
other woman, a stranger to me, talking. The stranger was one of the
parlor-boarders, I dare say. I gathered from the first words you
exchanged together, that you had met in the passage--she on her way
downstairs, and you on your way in from the back garden. Her next
question and your next answer informed me that this person was a friend
of my sister's, who felt a strong interest in her, and who knew that
you had just returned from a visit to Norah. So far, I only hesitated
to show myself, because I shrank, in my painful situation, from facing
a stranger. But when I heard my own name immediately afterward on your
lips and on hers, then I purposely came nearer to the curtain between
us, and purposely listened.

"A mean action, you will say? Call it mean, if you like. What better can
you expect from such a woman as I am?

"You were always famous for your memory. There is no necessity for my
repeating the words you spoke to your friend, and the words your friend
spoke to you, hardly an hour since. When you read these lines, you
will know, as well as I know, what those words told me. I ask for no
particulars; I will take all your reasons and all your excuses for
granted. It is enough for me to know that you and Mr. Pendril have been
searchi