‘I suppose I must.’

Her looks belied her words.

‘What makes you so strange—­ill?’ said Owen again.

‘I can’t believe Mrs. Morris wrong.’

’But look at this, Cytherea.  If it is clear to us that the woman had blue eyes two years ago, she must have blue eyes now, whatever Mrs. Morris or anybody else may fancy.  Any one would think that Manston could change the colour of a woman’s eyes to hear you.’

‘Yes,’ she said, and paused.

‘You say yes, as if he could,’ said Owen impatiently.

‘By changing the woman herself,’ she exclaimed.  ’Owen, don’t you see the horrid—­what I dread?—­that the woman he lives with is not Mrs. Manston—­that she was burnt after all—­and that I am his wife!’

She tried to support a stoicism under the weight of this new trouble, but no!  The unexpected revulsion of ideas was so overwhelming that she crept to him and leant against his breast.

Before reflecting any further upon the subject Graye led her upstairs and got her to lie down.  Then he went to the window and stared out of it up the lane, vainly endeavouring to come to some conclusion upon the fantastic enigma that confronted him.  Cytherea’s new view seemed incredible, yet it had such a hold upon her that it would be necessary to clear it away by positive proof before contemplation of her fear should have preyed too deeply upon her.

‘Cytherea,’ he said, ’this will not do.  You must stay here alone all the afternoon whilst I go to Carriford.  I shall know all when I return.’

‘No, no, don’t go!’ she implored.

‘Soon, then, not directly.’  He saw her subtle reasoning—­that it was folly to be wise.

Reflection still convinced him that good would come of persevering in his intention and dispelling his sister’s idle fears.  Anything was better than this absurd doubt in her mind.  But he resolved to wait till Sunday, the first day on which he might reckon upon seeing Mrs. Manston without suspicion.  In the meantime he wrote to Edward Springrove, requesting him to go again to Mrs. Manston’s former lodgings.

XVIII.  THE EVENTS OF THREE DAYS

1.  MARCH THE EIGHTEENTH

Sunday morning had come, and Owen was trudging over the six miles of hill and dale that lay between Tolchurch and Carriford.

Edward Springrove’s answer to the last letter, after expressing his amazement at the strange contradiction between the verses and Mrs. Morris’s letter, had been to the effect that he had again visited the neighbour of the dead Mr. Brown, and had received as near a description of Mrs. Manston as it was possible to get at second-hand, and by hearsay.  She was a tall woman, wide at the shoulders, and full-chested, and she had a straight and rather large nose.  The colour of her eyes the informant did not know, for she had only seen the lady in the street as she went in or out.  This confusing remark was added.  The woman had almost recognized Mrs. Manston when she had called with her husband lately, but she had kept her veil down.  Her residence, before she came to Hoxton, was quite unknown to this next-door neighbour, and Edward could get no manner of clue to it from any other source.