“Who?” she replied warmly, reproach in her tone. She was a kind-hearted woman, and the scene in her drawing-room had really cost her a few minutes’ sleep. “Why, Mr. Lindo, to be sure. Whom else should I mean? I suppose you went in last night at once and told him how much we all sympathized with him? Indeed, I hope you did not leave him until you saw him well to bed, for I am sure he was hardly fit to be left alone, poor fellow!” Mr. Clode stood silent, and looked troubled. Really, if it had occurred to him, he would have called to see Lindo. But it had not occurred to him, after what had happened—perhaps because he had been busied about things which “seemed worth while.” He regretted now, since Mrs. Hammond seemed to think it so much a matter of course, that he had not done so; the more as the omission compelled him to choose his side earlier than he need have done. However, it was too late now. So he shook his head. “I have not seen him, Mrs. Hammond,” he said gravely. “I have not been to the rectory.” “What! you have not seen him?” she cried in amazement. “No, I have not,” he answered, a slight tinge of hauteur in his manner. After all, he reflected that he would have found it painful to play another part before Laura after disclosing so much of his mind to her. “What is more, Mrs. Hammond,” he continued, “I am not anxious to see him; for, to tell you the truth, I fear that the meeting could only be a painful one.” “Why, you do not mean to say,” the lady answered in a low, awe-stricken voice, “that you think he knew anything about it, Mr. Clode?” “At any rate,” the curate replied firmly, “I cannot acquit him.” “Not acquit him!—Mr. Lindo!” she stammered. “No, I cannot,” Clode replied, striving to express in his voice and manner his extreme conscientiousness and the gloomy sense of responsibility under which he had arrived at his decision. “I cannot get out of my head,” he continued, “Lord Dynmore’s remark that, if the circumstances aroused suspicion in my mind, they could scarcely fail to apprise Mr. Lindo, who was more nearly concerned, of the truth, or something like the truth. Mind!” the curate added with a great show of candor, “I do not say, Mrs. Hammond, that Mr. Lindo knew. I only say I think he suspected.” “Well, _that_ is very good of you!” Mrs. Hammond exclaimed, displaying a spirit and a power of sarcasm he had not expected. “I dare say Mr. Lindo will be much obliged to you for _that!_ But, for my part, I think it is a distinction without a difference!” “Oh, no!” the curate protested hastily. “Well, I think it is, at any rate!” retorted the lady, very red in the face, and with all the bugles in her bonnet shaking. “However, everyone to his opinion. But that is not mine, and I am sorry it is yours. Why, you are his curate!” she added in a tone of indignant wonder, which brought the blood to Clode’s cheeks, and made him bite his lip in impotent anger. “You ought to be the last person to doubt him!”