Mrs. Diggs creased her forehead in puzzled style, and bent her face closer toward Claire's. "What on earth do you suppose it was that made him dart off so suddenly to Europe?" she asked. Claire stooped, as though to discover some kind of objectionable speck in the cup of chocolate that she was stirring, and then removed what she had found, with much apparent care. "He did go quite unexpectedly, did he not?" she said, lowering her head still more as she put the speck on her saucer and examined it with an excellent counterfeit of the way we regard such things when uncertain if their origin be animal or vegetable. She wondered to herself, at the same time, whether Mrs. Diggs would notice her increased color, or whether she herself had merely imagined that her color had undergone any sort of change. "At some other time," she went on, letting the words loiter in utterance, with a very neat simulation of preoccupied attention ... "at some other time, Mrs. Diggs, I should like to talk more with you about Mrs. Van Horn's brother. But just now I want to ask you about Mrs. Van Horn herself." Here Claire briskly raised her head. The problem of the aggressive speck had seemingly been solved. "I have heard Mr. Thurston mention that he had a sister of that name," she continued, now speaking with speed, "but he told me almost nothing regarding her. She appears to be a very important person." Mrs. Diggs glanced toward a distant table at which she had already seen her cousin seat herself. Then she turned to Claire again, as though confident of how safely remote was the lady whom she at once proceeded to discuss.