Duchessa made no reply.

"Pia, what _is_ the matter?" asked Trix again.

"I have told you, nothing," responded the Duchessa.

Trix shook her head. "Yes; there is. You're unhappy. You've been--you can
tell me to mind my own business, if you like--you've been horribly
prickly lately. You've tried to hurt my feelings, and Tibby's, and now
you've tried to hurt Doctor Hilary's. And he didn't deserve it in the
least, but he thought, for a moment, he did. And it isn't like you, Pia.
It isn't one bit. Do tell me what's the matter?"

"Nothing," said Pia again.

"Darling, that's a--a white lie at all events."

Pia coloured. "Anyhow it's not worth talking about," she said.

"Are you sure it isn't?" urged Trix. "Couldn't I help the weeniest bit?"

The Duchessa shook her head.

"Darling," said Trix again, and she slipped her arm through Pia's.

"I'm all one big bruise," said Pia suddenly.

Trix stroked her hand.

"It is entirely foolish of me to care," said the Duchessa slowly. "But I
happen to have trusted someone rather implicitly. I never dreamed it
possible the person could stoop to act a lie. I would not have minded the
thing itself,--it would have been absurd for me to have done so. But it
hurt rather considerably that the person should have deceived me in the
matter, in fact have acted a deliberate lie about it. I am honestly doing
my best to forget the whole thing, but I am being constantly reminded of
it."

Trix sat up very straight. So that was it, she told herself. How idiotic
of her not to have guessed at once,--days ago, that is,--when she herself
had made her marvellous discovery. It was now quite plain to her mind
that Pia must have made it too. It was Doctor Hilary whom she believed to
be the fraud, the friend whom she had trusted, and who had acted a lie.
The whole oddness of Pia's behaviour became suddenly perfectly clear to
her. Tibby had told her that it had begun on her return to Woodleigh.
Well, that must have been when she first found out. How she'd found out,
Trix didn't know. But that was beside the mark. She evidently had found
out.

Trix's mind ran back over various little incidents. She remembered the
snub administered to Father Dormer the evening after her arrival. The new
under-gardener had been the subject of conversation then, of course
reminding Pia of the Hall. And she had snubbed Father Dormer, as she had
snubbed Doctor Hilary a few minutes ago. All Pia's snubs and sudden
prickles