Besides, there's somebody else to think of. I hope
he hasn't been disturbed already!"
"Somebody else?" echoed the girl with a gasp. There was no longer any
fear that her curiosity had not caught fire. Mrs. Ellsworth was
satisfied.
"Yes, somebody else," she condescended to repeat. "A certain person has
come since you went out. I suppose, _in the circumstances_, you do not
need to be told _who_."
"I--I don't know what you mean by 'in the circumstances'," Annesley
stammered.
"That's not intelligent of you, considering where you have spent the
evening," sneered Mrs. Ellsworth.
Annesley's ears tingled as if they had been boxed. Could it be that Mrs.
Ellsworth knew of the trick played on her--knew that her companion had
not been to the Smiths'?
"I'm afraid I don't understand," she deprecated.
Mrs. Ellsworth sat in bed staring up at her. "Either you are a fool," she
said, "or else I have caught you or _him_ in a lie. I don't know which
yet. But I soon shall. Perhaps you were not the only person in this house
who went out to-night with a latchkey. Now do you guess?"
"No, I don't," the girl had to answer, though a dreadful idea was
whirring an alarm in her brain.
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