While he sobbed out his accusations against nurse, Gabriella, holding his hand tightly in hers, turned toward Fifth Avenue, and by the time he was pacified, they had walked several blocks together, with nurse and Fanny sedately bringing up the rear.  Then, at last, having reasoned him alike out of his temper and his generosity, Gabriella retraced her steps, and entering the house with her latchkey, ran quickly up the stairs to the closed door of Mrs. Fowler’s room.  As she raised her hand to knock the sound of her own name reached her, and almost involuntarily she hesitated for an instant.

“Yes, Gabriella is out.  I saw her a minute ago on her way to the Park with the children.”

“Well, somebody ought to tell her, mother.  I think it is perfectly outrageous to keep her in ignorance.  Everybody is talking about it.”

“Oh, Patty, you couldn’t!  How on earth could you tell her a thing like that?” wailed George’s mother, and she went on with a plaintive sigh as Gabriella opened the door:  “George was always so mad about beauty, and though Gabriella has a fine face, she isn’t exactly—­”

Then, at the startling apparition of Gabriella, with her face paling slowly above her black furs and her large indignant eyes fixed on them both, Mrs. Fowler wavered and broke off with a pathetic clutch at the pleasantness which had entirely departed from her manner.  “Why, Gabriella, I didn’t know you had come in!  I was just saying to Patty—­” It was, as she said afterwards to her husband, exactly as if her mind had become suddenly blank.  She couldn’t to save her life think of a single word to add to her sentence, and all the time Gabriella was standing there, as white as a ghost, with her accusing eyes turning slowly from one to the other of them.  “Somehow I just couldn’t lie to her when she looked like that, and the truth seemed too dreadful,” Mrs. Fowler added that night to Archibald.  “Damn George!” was Mr. Fowler’s fervent retort.  “And it took me so by surprise I almost fainted, for I’d never in my life heard him swear before,” his wife had commented later.  “But aren’t men strange?  To think he knew how all the time and kept it to himself!  I declare they are entirely too secretive for anything!”

“I heard what you were saying when I knocked,” began Gabriella, with perfect composure.  “I don’t quite know what it was about, but I think—­I think—­”

“It was nothing, dear; Patty and I were gossiping,” replied Mrs. Fowler, with an eagerness that was almost violent.  “Oh, Patty, you wouldn’t!”—­for Patty had broken in, conquering and merciless, with the declaration:  “If you don’t tell Gabriella, mamma, I’m going to.  It’s outrageous, anyhow, I’ve always said so, the way people keep things from women.  Gabriella has a right to know what everybody is saying.”

“Of course I’ve a right to know,” rejoined Gabriella, with a firmness before which Mrs. Fowler felt herself gradually dissolving—­“melting away” was the description she gave of her feeling.  “If anybody has a right to know, I suppose I have.  Of course, it’s about George.  I know that much, anyhow,” she added quietly.