“Clifford,” says the heiress of Wardour, standing beside her lover, one winter day, not long after the extinction of the Diamond Coterie, “Clifford I have been to Mapleton today, for the first time since—”
She pauses abruptly, and her lover draws her closer to his side, with all his olden assurance shining in the eyes he bends down upon her.
“Since the drama ended,” he finishes. “You have been to Mapleton, beloved! tell me about it.”
“There’s something I wish to tell you, Clifford; something that in full, Mr. Bathurst generously kept out of his story when he told us the rest; something that is known as it is only to Mrs. Lamotte, Sybil, Evan, Mr. Belknap, Mr. Bathurst, and myself, but which I think I had better tell you now.”
“I am listening Conny.”
“Well, you see when the robbers mad
