"You knew that she had stolen away from me--that she had resorted to a most unworthy subterfuge in order to hold this conversation with you?" "No; I had asked her to come, and on that very afternoon if possible, but I never knew what means she took for doing so; I didn't ask and she didn't say." "But she talked of her marriage? She must have said something about an event which is usually considered the greatest in a woman's life." "Yes, she spoke of it." "And of me?" "Yes, she spoke of you." "And in what terms? I cannot refrain from asking you, Mr. Hazen, I am in such ignorance as to her real attitude towards me; her conduct is so mysterious; the reasons she gives for it so puerile." "She said nothing against you or her marriage. She mentioned both, but not in a manner that would add to your or my knowledge of her intentions. My sister disappointed me, sir. She was much less open than I wished. All that I could make out of her manner and conversation was the overpowering shock she felt at seeing me again and seeing me so changed. She didn't even tell me when and where we might meet again. When she left, she was as much lost to me as she was to you, and I am no less interested in finding her than you are yourself. I had no idea she did not mean to return to you when she went away from this hotel." Mr. Ransom sprang upright in an agitation the other may have shared, but of which he gave no token. "Do you mean to say," he asked, "that you cannot tell me where the woman you call your sister is now?" "No more than you can give me the same necessary information in regard to your wife. I am waiting like yourself to hear from her--and waiting with as little hope." Had he seen Ransom's hand close convulsively over the pocket in which her few strange words to him were lying, that a slight tinge of sarcasm gave edge to the last four words? "But this is not like my wife," protested Ransom, hesitating to accuse the other of falsehood, yet evidently doubting him from the bottom of his heart. "Why deceive us both? She was never a disingenuous woman." "In childhood she had her incomprehensible moments," observed Hazen, with an ambiguous lift of his shoulders; then, as Ransom made an impatient move, added with steady composure: "I have candidly answered all your questions whether agreeable or otherwise, and the fact that I am as much shocked as yourself by these mad and totally incredible statements of hers about a newly recovered sister should prove to you that she is not following any lead of mine in this dissemination of a bare-faced falsehood."