'Anything rather than look at _me_!' Before I could stop her, she had
left the hall. I am not quite easy about it, Betteredge. Would you mind
telling Rosanna that I meant no unkindness? I have been a little hard on
her, perhaps, in my own thoughts--I have almost hoped that the loss of
the Diamond might be traced to _her_. Not from any ill-will to the poor
girl: but----" He stopped there, and going back to the billiard-table,
began to knock the balls about once more.
After what had passed between the Sergeant and me, I knew what it was
that he had left unspoken as well as he knew it himself.
Nothing but the tracing of the Moonstone to our second housemaid could
now raise Miss Rachel above the infamous suspicion that rested on her
in the mind of Sergeant Cuff. It was no longer a question of quieting
my young lady's nervous excitement; it was a question of proving her
innocence. If Rosanna had done nothing to compromise herself, the hope
which Mr. Franklin confessed to having felt would have been hard enough
on her in all conscience. But this was not the case. She had pretended
to be ill, and had gone secretly to Frizinghall. She had been up all
night, making something or destroying something, in private.
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