"Now, Frances, it's no use your putting on frills!--you simply don't know what you're talking about. Here's her description--read it for yourself; no one can read it and possibly mistake her. You told me yourself her guardian's name was Emmett; well, he was murdered the night before last--murdered, mind!--read about it yourself! the story's a curdler!--and they say she did it!--I don't say she did it----" "You'd better not!" "But they do; and they'll lock her up for it as sure as we are standing here! Anyway you look at it. We've nothing to thank Strathmoira for for getting us mixed up with a thing like this. My hat! I'd like to talk to him!" "You talk to him! You don't know what you are talking about now! You've not the slightest right to take it for granted that--that my Dorothy has anything to do with the person in the papers." "Don't talk stuff and nonsense!--it's you who're talking through your hat!--the whole thing's as plain as a pikestaff; do you suppose I don't wish it wasn't?--that I want us to be dragged into a mess of this sort? Oh yes, it's just the sort of thing I would like! Why, it tells you here how Strathmoira came across her; and how it is that she only knew him as Eric Frazer. He's been cruising about in that van of his--you know, mater, that rotten old caravan of his?" "It's a rotten old caravan, is it, now? You were anxious enough to 'cruise about' with him in it!" "I daresay!--never again!--no thank you! When she--or someone--had done for that poor beggar, Emmett, she bolted; she came on him in his van on Newcaster Heath; he gave her shelter for the night." "Why shouldn't he? He's the most chivalrous of men!" "All right; who said he wasn't? He seems to have been more chivalrous still next day, when he seems to have nearly killed a chap on his own account." "My son, you let your tongue run away with you!" "My dear mater, here it is in black and white! The chap, who seems to be something in the gipsy line, and rejoices in the name of Benjamin Hitchings, overheard her--that's Miss Gilbert--telling him the whole jolly tale--giving herself completely away in fact. Strathmoira--whom the paper calls Frazer--caught him listening, and seems to have as nearly as possible broken his neck for him--you know what a dab he is at those ju-jitsu tricks; I expect he played one of those pretty little capers off on Mr Hitchings. Anyhow, the police are after him as well as her; warrants are out for both of them. No wonder he preferred the middle of the night to dump her at our front door; goodness knows I don't set up to be a prophet, but I should like to know what the betting is that it's a good long time before we see or hear anything more of the Earl of Strathmoira." "James, are you forgetting that the Earl of Strathmoira is a relative of mine and of your own?" "That's what makes it too utterly too-too!--and Miss Gilbert is Frances' particular friend! Oh, we're quite in the thick of it!"