Fleda smiled again. "I haven't the least idea." "She abused you, and I defended you. She denounced you—"!

Blankness was for a moment on Mrs. Gereth's brow; then light broke—she visibly remembered the scene in the breakfast-room after Mona's night at Poynton. "Because I contrasted you—told him you were the one?" Her eyes looked deep. "You were—you are still!" Owen answered with a kind of gay despair. "God knows, Miss Vetch, where or when or what my marriage is! If it isn't 'off,' it certainly, at the point things have reached, isn't on. I haven't seen Mona for ten days, and for a week I haven't heard from her. She used to write me every week, don't you know? She won't budge from Waterbath, and I haven't budged from town." Then he suddenly broke out: "If she does chuck me, will mother come round?"

She spoke with decision, but Owen seemed still unsatisfied. "You won't go away, I hope?" Fleda stayed her hand. "No, no—I'm superstitious." This made his companion thoughtful again. "Can you take such pleasure in her being 'finished'—a poor girl you've once loved?"