He smiled bitterly.
"I have my own opinion of your fidelity and of his honor," he said.
"You couldn't even send him into the next room without whispering to him first.
Never mind that now.
At least you know that Julian Gray is in love with you."
"Mr. Julian Gray has never breathed a word of it to me."
"A man can show a woman that he loves her, without saying it in words."
Mercy's power of endurance began to fail her.
Not even Grace Roseberry had spoken more insultingly to her of Julian than Horace was speaking now.
"Whoever says that of Mr. Julian Gray, lies!" she answered, warmly.
"Then Lady Janet lies," Horace retorted.
"Lady Janet never said it!
Lady Janet is incapable of saying it!"
"She may not have said it in so many words; but she never denied it when I said it.
I reminded her of the time when Julian Gray first heard from me that I was going to marry you: he was so overwhelmed that he was barely capable of being civil to me.
Lady Janet was present, and could not deny it.
I asked her if she had observed, since then, signs of a confidential understanding between you two.
She could not deny the signs.
I asked if she had ever found you two together.
She could not deny that she had found you together, this very day, under circumstances which justified suspicion.
Yes! yes!
Look as angry as you like! you don't know what has been going on upstairs.
Lady Janet is bent on breaking off our engagement—and Julian Gray is at the bottom of it."
As to Julian, Horace was utterly wrong.
But as to Lady Janet, he echoed the warning words which Julian himself had spoken to Mercy.
She was staggered, but she still held to her own opinion.
"I don't believe it," she said, firmly.
He advanced a step, and fixed his angry eyes on her searchingly.
"Do you know why Lady Janet sent for me?" he asked.
"No."
"Then I will tell you.
Lady Janet is a stanch friend of yours, there is no denying that.
She wished to inform me that she had altered her mind about your promised explanation of your conduct.
She said,
'Reflection has convinced me that no explanation is required; I have laid my positive commands on my adopted daughter that no explanation shall take place.'
Has she done that?"
"Yes."
"Now observe!
I waited till she had finished, and then I said,
'What have I to do with this?' Lady Janet has one merit—she speaks out.
'You are to do as I do,' she answered.
'You are to consider that no explanation is required, and you are to consign the whole matter to oblivion from this time forth.'
'Are you serious?' I asked.
'Quite serious.'
'In that case I have to inform your ladyship that you insist on more than you may suppose: you insist on my breaking my engagement to Miss Roseberry.
Either I am to have the explanation that she has promised me, or I refuse to marry her.'
How do you think Lady Janet took that?
She shut up her lips, and she spread out her hands, and she looked at me as much as to say,
'Just as you please!
Refuse if you like; it's nothing to me!'"