But she knew very little about them and wondered how they could in any way have contaminated Noely.
Thinking therefore she must somehow stand up for Noely and her mother, she said,
“I think you are being needlessly apprehensive about such places and I actually never went into any Casinos ever nor did I have anything to do with gamblers.”
“How can you say that,” the Earl demanded, “when you were living in the same house as D’Arcy Fairburn? Don’t pretend to me, Noella. He was a compulsive gambler, a seducer of women and a swine to whom no decent man should speak.”
There was deep condemnation in the Earl’s words.
What he said sounded even worse because, although he spoke vehemently, his voice was not loud but sharp and as cutting as a whip.
For a moment the very air seemed to vibrate wi
