“Yes,” she resumed, “I have read the report of the inquest. If I know nothing else, I know that the murder at Zeeland can’t be the discovery which you are bent on keeping from me. Don’t be alarmed for the preservation of your secret! I am too much discouraged to try again.” The servant interrupted them by answering the bell; Alban once more escaped detection. Emily gave her orders with an approach to the old gayety of her school days. “Tea, as soon as possible--and let us have the new cake. Are you too much of a man, Mr. Morris, to like cake?” In this state of agitation, he was unreasonably irritated by that playful question. “There is one thing I like better than cake,” he said; “and that one thing is a plain explanation.” His tone puzzled her. “Have I said anything to offend you?” she asked. “Surely you can make allowance for a girl’s curiosity? Oh, you shall have your explanation--and, what is more, you shall have it without reserve!” She was as good as her word. What she had thought, and what she had planned, when he left her after his last visit, was frankly and fully told. “If you wonder how I discovered the library,” she went on, “I must refer you to my aunt’s lawyer. He lives in the City--and I wrote to him to help me. I don’t consider that my time has been wasted. Mr. Morris, we owe an apology to Mrs. Rook.” Alban’s astonishment, when he heard this, forced its way to expression in words. “What can you possibly mean?” he asked. The tea was brought in before Emily could reply. She filled the cups, and sighed as she looked at the cake. “If Cecilia was here, how she would enjoy it!” With that complimentary tribute to her friend, she handed a slice to Alban. He never even noticed it. “We have both of us behaved most unkindly to Mrs. Rook,” she resumed. “I can excuse your not seeing it; for I should not have seen it either, but for the newspaper. While I was reading, I had an opportunity of thinking over what we said and did, when the poor woman’s behavior so needlessly offended us. I was too excited to think, at the time--and, besides, I had been upset, only the night before, by what Miss Jethro said to me.” Alban started. “What has Miss Jethro to do with it?” he asked. “Nothing at all,” Emily answered. “She spoke to me of her own private affairs. A long story--and you wouldn’t be interested in it. Let me finish what I had to say. Mrs. Rook was naturally reminded of the murder, when she heard that my name was Brown; and she must certainly have been struck--as I was--by the coincidence of my father’s death taking place at the same time when his unfortunate namesake was killed. Doesn’t this sufficiently account for her agitation when she looked at the locket? We first took her by surprise: and then we suspected her of Heaven knows what, because the poor creature didn’t happen to have her wits about her, and to remember at the right moment what a very common name ‘James Brown’ is. Don’t you see it as I do?”