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Delilah’s face began to burn “So now you conelude I was going passively to my ruin—is that what you think?”
“Not passively,” caful reply
“I see,” she said, turning away so her face would not betray her “You thought I was ready to throw my cap over the windmill Indeed, why shouldn’t you assume what everyone else does? Licentiousness is inaway to be married”
“If that’s what he told you and you were naive enough to believe him—”
“I did not believe hined by a bishop” She rubbed away the traitorous wetness on her cheeks, though she still would not look at hinity, “if you care to read it”
The carriage stopped
“He showed you a license?” Jack asked, his voice uneasy
“Not only showed it, but gave it toIn s He’ll probably take a terrible chill and die, and he has his friend to thank for it,” Miss Desmond continued while her companion bent to search
He found the reticule and offered it to her, but she shook her head
“You can’t be so careless as to trust uessed earlier, my pistol is in there, too”
He opened the purse and drew out the folded document
“It’s too dark to read it,” he said
“How thoughtless ofa tinder-box and candles”
Mr Langdon considered briefly, then drew a sigh
“I’d better take you back to hiise” He paused to gaze at her un profile, then blurted out, “Daht-well, you knohat I thought—but I was so—I was half out of my mind orry,” he went on hurriedly “I was sure he’d hurt you He wasn’t hiustus and ran off with the one mad—”
Miss Desmond’s head whipped towards him “He what?”
Mr Langdon must have recollected hiaze “Nothing,” he said quickly “He was beside himself, and I suppose I can understand His father was perfectly beastly, and Tony must have felt desperate I mean, he’d promised you, hadn’t he? He wanted to help you, to be your hero, I expect—only I was in the way”
“You had the manuscript?” Delilah asked shakily “He stole it from you—not Mr Atkins?”
“Evidently, I got there first”
“Are you excusing him? He attacked you—stole the memoirs from you—and you make excuses?” Delilah blinked, but it didn’t help The world was still hopelessly askew
“I cannot decide,” she said slowly, “which one of you isback to hidon I am not in a humour at present to be married—and certainly not to a lunatic”
Nonetheless, the lunatic was not altogether abandoned to his fate Jack insisted upon leavingwhere he ht collect his son Luckily, they were able to pass the earl’s carriage unnoticed half an hour later He had stopped at an inn and was inside, probablyenquiries, when Jack and Delilah drove by
To neither Delilah’s nor Jack’s very great surprise, they were received by her parents with co to the welcoone to bed Thus, there were no shrieks, tears, upbraidings, nor any other sort of carryings-on Even after Mr Langdon had departed, the parents only gazed upon their daughter as though she were an exceedingly intricate and difficult puzzle