She broke off.

’Then, Monica, you ought to make known to him what you have been concealing.  If you are telling the truth, that confession can’t be anything very dreadful.’

’Alice, I am willing to make an agreement.  If my husband will promise never to come near Clevedon until I send for him I will go and live there with you and Virgie.’

‘He has promised that, darling,’ cried Miss Madden delightedly.

’Not to me.  He has only said that he will make his home in London for a time:  that means he would come whenever he wished, if it were only to speak to you and Virgie.  But he must undertake never to come near until I give him permission.  If he will promise this, and keep his word, I pledge myself to let him know the whole truth in less than a year.  Whether I live or die, he shall be told the truth in less than a year.’

Before going to bed Alice wrote and dispatched a few lines to Widdowson, requesting an interview with him as soon as possible.  She would come to his house at any hour he liked to appoint.  The next afternoon brought a reply, and that same evening Miss Madden went to Herne Hill.  As a result of what passed there, a day or two saw the beginning of the long-contemplated removal to Clevedon.  Widdowson found a lodging in the neighbourhood of his old home; he had engaged never to cross the bounds of Somerset until he received his wife’s permission.

As soon as this compact was established Monica wrote to Miss Nunn.  A short submissive letter.  ’I am about to leave London, and before I go I very much wish to see you.  Will you allow me to call at some hour when I could speak to you in private?  There is something I must make known to you, and I cannot write it.’  After a day’s interval came the reply, which was still briefer.  Miss Nunn would be at home at half-past eight this or the next evening.

Monica’s announcement that she must go out alone after nightfall alarmed her sisters.  When told that her visit was to Rhoda Nunn they were somewhat relieved, but Alice begged to be permitted to accompany her.

‘It will be lost trouble,’ Monica declared.  ’More likely than not there is a spy waiting to follow me wherever I go.  Your assurance that I really went to Miss Barfoot’s won’t be needed.’

When the others still opposed her purpose she passed from irony into anger.

’Have you undertaken to save him the expense of private detectives?  Have you promised never to let me go out of your sight?’

‘Certainly I have not,’ said Alice.

‘Nor I, dear,’ protested Virginia.  ’He has never asked anything of the kind.’

’Then you may be sure that the spies are still watching me.  Let them have something to do, poor creatures.  I shall go alone, so you needn’t say any more.’