Читать книгу: «Luttrell Of Arran», страница 17

Kate bowed, and smiled her thanks, and, once again alone, sat down to ruminate an her fortune.

CHAPTER XXVI. THE DINNER IN THE SCHOOLROOM

Sir Within could not persuade Mademoiselle to accept his invitation for herself and her pupils to dinner, and was about to take his leave, when Ada suddenly said, “Why not dine with us, Sir Within?”

“Fi! donc, Mademoiselle!” broke in the governess. “How could you think of such a thing? Sir Within Wardle sit down to a schoolroom dinner!”

“But why need it be a schoolroom dinner, Mademoiselle Heinzleman? Why not tell cook that we mean to have company to-day, and make Bickards wait on us, and tell George to wear his gloves, just as if papa were at home?”

“Oh” broke in Sir Within, “I have seen quite enough – more than enough – of all that, dear Ada; but if I could be permitted to join your own little daily dinner of the schoolroom, as you call it, that would really be a treat to me.”

“I invite you, then!” said Ada. “Mademoiselle owes me a favour for that wonderful German theme I wrote, and I take this as my reward. We dine at three, Sir Within, and, I warn you, on mutton-broth and mutton something else; but Kate and I will make ourselves as fine as we may, and be as entertaining as possible.”

While the two girls scampered off, laughing merrily at the discomfiture of the governess, that respectable lady remained to offer profuse apologies to Sir Within for the liberty, childish though it was, that had been taken with him, and to excuse herself from any imputation of participating in it.

She little knew, indeed, with what honest sincerity he had accepted the proposal. Of the great game of life, as played by fine people, he had seen it to satiety. He was thoroughly wearied of all the pleasures of the table, as he was of all the captivations which witty conveners and clever talkers can throw over society. Perhaps, from his personal experience, he knew how artificial such displays are – how studied the à propos, how carefully in ambush the impromptu – and that he longed for the hearty, healthful enjoyment of young, fresh, joyous natures, just as one might turn from the oppressive odours of a perfumer’s shop to taste with ecstasy the fresh flowers of a garden. It was, therefore, as he expressed it to the governess, a perfect fête to him to assist at that little dinner, and he was deeply honoured by the invitation.

Mademoiselle was charmed with the old Baronet’s politeness. It was ceremonious enough even for Germany, he smiled so blandly and bowed so reverently, and often it was like a memory of the Fatherland just to listen to him; and, indeed, it was reassuring to her to hear from him that he had once been a Minister at the Court of a Herzog, and had acquired his “moden” in this true and legitimate fashion. And thus did they discuss for hours “aesthetic,” and idealism, and sympathy, mysterious affinity, impulsive destiny, together with all the realisms which the Butter-brod life of Germany can bring together, so that when she arose to dress for dinner, she could not help muttering to herself, as she went, that he was “a deeply skilled in the human heart-and-far acquainted with the mind’s operations – but not the less on that account a fresh-with-a-youthful sincerity-endowed man.”

The dinner, though not served in the schoolroom, was just as simple as Ada promised, and she laughingly asked Sir Within if he preferred his beer frothed or still, such being the only choice of liquor afforded him.

“Mademoiselle is shocked at the way we treat you,” said she, laughing, “but I have told her that your condescension would be ill repaid if we made any attempt to lessen its cost, and it must be a ‘rice-pudding day’ in your life.”

And how charmingly they talked, these two girls! Ada doing the honours as a hostess, and Kate, as the favoured friend, who aided her to entertain an honoured guest. They told him, too, how the fresh bouquet that decked the table had been made by themselves to mark the sense they had of his presence, and that the coffee had been prepared by their own hands.

“Now, do say, Sir Within, that dining with Royal Highnesses and Supreme Somethings is but a second-rate pleasure compared to an Irish stew in a schoolroom, and a chat round a fire that has been lighted with Bonnycastle’s Algebra. Yes, Mademoiselle,” Kate said, “I had to make light of simple equations for once! I was thinking of that story of the merchant, who lighted his fire with the King’s bond when his Majesty deigned to dine with him. I puzzled my head to remember which of our books lay nearest our heart, and I hesitated long between Ollendorff and Bonnycastle.”

“And what decided you?” asked Sir Within.

“What so often decides a doubt – convenience. Bonnycastle had the worst binding, and was easier to burn.”

“If you so burn to study algebra, Mademoiselle,” said the governess, who had misunderstood the whole conversation, “you must first show yourself more ‘eifrig’ – how you call zeal? – for your arithmetic.”

“You shall have full liberty, when you pay me a visit, to burn all the volumes on such subjects you find,” said Sir Within.

“Oh, I’d go through the whole library,” cried Kate, eagerly, “if I could only find one such as Garret O’Moore did.”

“I never heard of his fortune.”

“Nor I. Do tell it, Kate.”

“Mademoiselle has forbidden all my legends,” said she, calmly.

“I’m sure,” said Sir Within, “she will recal the injunction for this time.”

“It is very short,” said Kate; and then with infinite archness, turning to the governess, added, “and it has a moral.”

The governess nodded a grave permission, and the other began:

“There was once on a time a great family in the west of Ireland called the O’Moores, who, by years of extravagance, spent everything they had in the world, leaving the last of the name, a young man, so utterly destitute, that he had scarcely food to eat, and not a servant to wait on him. He lived in a lonely old house, of which the furniture had been sold off, bit by bit, and nothing remained but a library of old books, which the neighbours did not care for.”

“Algebras and Ollendorff’s, I suppose,” whispered Sir Within; and she smiled and went on:

“In despair at not finding a purchaser, and pinched by the cold of the long winter’s nights, he used to bring an armful of them every night into his room to make his fire. He had not, naturally, much taste for books or learning, but it grieved him sorely to do this; he felt it like a sort of sacrilege, but he felt the piercing cold more, and so he gave in. Well, one night, as he brought in his store, and was turning over the leaves – which he always did before setting fire to them – he came upon a little square volume, with the strangest letters ever he saw; they looked like letters upside down, and gone mad, and some of them were red, and some black, and some golden, and between every page of print there was a sheet of white paper without anything on it. O’Moore examined it well, and at last concluded it must have been some old monkish chronicle, and that the blank pages were left for commentaries on it. At all events, it could have no interest for him, as he couldn’t read it, and so he put it down on the hearth till he wanted it to burn.

“It was close on midnight, and nothing but a few dying embers were on the hearth, and no other light in the dreary room, when he took up the old chronicle, and tearing it in two, threw one half on the fire.

The moment he did so the flame sprang up bright as silver, lighting up the whole room, so that he could see even the old cobwebs on the ceiling, that had not been seen for yean and years, and at the same time a delicious music filled the air, and the sounds of children’s voices singing beautifully; but, strangest of all, in the very middle of the bright fire that now filled the whole hearth, there sat a little man with a scarlet cloak on him, and a scarlet hat and a white feather in it, and he smiled very graciously at O’Moore, and beckoned him over to him, but O’Moore was so frightened and so overcome he couldn’t stir. At last, as the flames got lower, the Tittle man’s gestures grew more energetic, and O’ Moore crept down on his knees, and said, “‘Do you want anything with me, Sir?’”

“‘Yes, Garret,’ said the little man,: ‘I want to be your friend, and to save you from ruin like the rest of your family. You were wrong to burn that book.’

“‘But I couldn’t read it,’ said Garret; ‘what use was it to me?’

“‘It was your own life, Garret O’Moore,’ said the little man, ‘and take care that you keep the part you have there, and study it carefully. It would have been, better for you if you had kept the whole of it.’

“And with that the flame sprang brightly up for a second or two, and then went black out, so that O’Moore had to grope about to find tinder to strike a light. He lit the only bit of candle he had, and began to examine the part of the book that remained, and what did he find but on every blank page there was a line – sometimes two – written as if to explain the substance of the printed page, and all in such a way as to show it was somebody’s life, and adventures – as, for instance: ‘Takes to the sea – goes to America – joins an expedition to the Far West – on the plantations – marries – wife dies – off to China – marries again.’ I needn’t go on: everything that was ever to happen to him was written there till he was forty-five years of age, the rest was burned; but it was all fortunate – all, to the very end. He grew to be very rich, and prospered in everything, for whenever he was faint-hearted or depressed, he always said, ‘It wasn’t by being low and weak of heart that I begun this career of good fortune, and I must be stout and of high courage if I mean to go on with it.’ And he grew so rich that he bought back all the old acres of the O’Moores, and they have a hand rescuing a book from the flames on their arms till this day.”

“And the moral? – where’s the moral?” asked the governess.

“The moral, the moral!” said Kate, dubiously. “Well, I’m not exactly sure where it is, but I suppose it is this; that it’s far better to go to sea as a sailor than to sit down and burn your father’s library.”

“I have a notion, my dear Kate, that you yourself would like well to have a peep into destiny – am I wrong?”

“I would, Sir.”

“And you, Ada?”

“Why should she?” broke in Kate, eagerly; and then, as though shocked at her impetuosity, she went on, in a lower voice: “Ada makes her voyage in a three-decker, I am only clinging to a plank.”

“No, no, dearest,” said Ada, tenderly; “don’t say that.”

“Mademoiselle is looking at her watch,” said Sir Within, “and I must accept the signal.” And though she protested, elaborately too, that it was a mere habit with her, he arose to ring for his carriage. “I am not going without the sketch you promised me, Ada,” said he – “the pencil sketch of the old fountain.”

“Oh, Kate’s is infinitely better. I am ashamed to see mine after it.”

“Why not let me have both?”

“Yes,” said the governess, “that will be best. I’ll go and fetch them.”

Ada stood for a moment irresolute, and then muttering, “Mine is really too bad,” hastened out of the room after Mademoiselle Heinzle-man.

“You are less merry than usual, Kate,” said Sir Within, as he took her hand and looked at her with interest. “What is the reason?”

A faint, scarce perceptible motion of her brow was all she made in answer.

“Have you not been well?”

“Yes, Sir. I am quite well.”

“Have you had news that has distressed you?”

“Where from?” asked she, hurriedly.

“From your friends – from home.”

“Don’t you know, Sir, that I have neither!”

“I meant, my dear child – I meant to say, that perhaps you had heard or learned something that gave you pain.”

“Yes, Sir,” broke she in, “that is it. Oh, if I could tell you – ”

“Why not write it to me, dear child?”

“My writing is coarse and large, and I misspell words; and, besides, it is such a slow way to tell what one’s heart is full of – and then I’d do it so badly,” faltered she out with pain.

“Suppose, then, I were to settle some early day for you all to come over to Dalradern; you could surely find a moment to tell me then?”

“Yes, Sir – yes,” cried she; and, seizing his hand, she kissed it passionately three or four times.

“Here they are,” said Ada, merrily – “here they are! And if Kate’s does ample justice to your beautiful fountain, mine has the merit of showing how ugly it might have been. Isn’t this hideous?”

After a few little pleasant common-places, Sir Within turned to Mademoiselle Heinzleman, and said: “I have rather an interesting book at Dalradern; at least, it would certainly have its interest for you, Mademoiselle. It is a copy of ‘Clavigo,’ with Herder’s marginal suggestions. Goethe had sent it to him for his opinion, and Herder returned it marked and annotated. You will do me an infinite favour to accept it.”

“Ach Gott!” said the governess, perfectly overwhelmed with the thought of such a treasure.

“Well, then, if the weather be fine on Tuesday, Mademoiselle, will you and my young friends here come over and dine with me? We shall say three o’clock for dinner, so that you need not be late on the road. My carriage will be here to fetch you at any hour you appoint.”

A joyous burst of delight from Ada, and a glance of intense gratitude from Kate, accompanied the more formal acceptance of the governess; and if Sir Within had but heard one tithe of the flattering things that were said of him, as he drove away, even his heart, seared as it was, would have been touched.

Kate, indeed, said least; but when Ada, turning abruptly to her, asked, “Don’t you love him?” a slight colour tinged her cheek, as she said, “I think he’s very kind, and very generous, and very – ”

“Go on, dear – go on,” cried Ada, throwing her arm around her – “finish; and very what?”

“I was going to say an impertinence,” whispered she, “and I’ll not.”

“Nine o’clock, young ladies, and still in the drawing-room!” exclaimed the governess, in a tone of reproach. “These are habits of dissipation, indeed – come away. Ach Gott! der Clavigo!” muttered she, with clasped hands. And the girls were hardly able to restrain a burst of laughter at the fervour of her voice and manner.

CHAPTER XXVII. KITTY

The wished-for Tuesday came at last, and with a fortune not always so favouring, brought with it a glorious morning, one of those bright, sharp, clear days, with a deep blue sky and frosty air, and with that sense of elasticity in the atmosphere which imparts itself to the spirits, and makes mere existence enjoyment. The girls were in ecstasy; they had set their hearts so much on this visit, that they would not let themselves trust to the signs of the weather on the night before, but were constantly running out to ask George the gardener, if that circle round the moon meant anything? – why were the stars so blue? – and why did they twinkle so much? – and was it a sign of fine weather that the river should be heard so clearly? Rickards, too, was importuned to consult the barometer, and impart his experiences of what might be expected from its indications. The gardener augured favourably, was pronounced intelligent, and tipped by Ada in secret. Rickards shook his head at the aspect of the mercury, and was called a “conceited old ass” for his pains. Not either of them treated with different measure than is meted by the public to those great organs of information which are supposed to be their guides, but are just as often their flatterers, for the little world of the family is marvellously like the great world of the nation.

“What a splendid day, Kate. How beautiful the waterfall will look, coming down in showers of diamonds, and how crisp and sharp the copper beech and the big ilex-trees over it. Oh, winter, if this be winter, is really the time for scenery! What makes you so grave, dear? I am wild with spirits to-day.”

“And so should I if I were you.”

“How can you say that,” said Ada, as she threw her arm around the other’s waist. “How can you, Kate, when you know how much cleverer you are, and quicker at everything – how you leave me behind at all I have been working at for years!”

“And never to need that same cleverness is worth it all, I am told!”

“How so? I don’t understand you.”

“I mean, that you are better off – better dealt with by Fortune to be a born lady than I, if I had all the gifts and all the powers you would bestow upon me.”

“This is one of your dark days, as you call them,” said Ada, reproachfully; “and you mean to make it one of mine, too, and I was so happy.”

“This, perhaps, is another of my gifts,” said she, with a mocking laugh, “and yet I was brought here to make you merry and light-hearted! Yes, dear, I overheard Mr. Grenfell tell your papa that his plan was a mistake, and that all ‘low-bred ones’ – that was the name he gave us – lost the little spirit they had when you fed them, and only grew lazy.”

“Oh, Kate, for shame!”

“The shame is not mine; it was he said it.”

“How sad you make me by saying these things.”

“Well, but we must own, Ada, he was right! I was – no, I won’t say happier, but fifty times as merry and light-hearted before I came here; and though gathering brushwood isn’t as picturesque as making a bouquet, I am almost sure I sang over the one, and only sighed over the other.”

Ada turned away her head and wiped the tears from her cheeks.

“Isn’t it a hopeful thing to try and make people happy?”

“But papa surely wished, and he believed that you would be happy,” said Ada, with something almost reproachful in her manner.

“All because he hadn’t read that little German fable of the Two Fairies – the one who always did something and failed, and the other who always promised and promised; watering the little plant of Hope, as he calls it, and making believe that the fruit would be, one day, so sweet and so luscious as no lips had ever tasted before. And it’s strange, Ada,” added she, in a graver tone – “it’s strange, but when I was out upon the mountains watching the goats, rambling all day alone in the deep heather, how I used to think and think! O dear! what wonderful things did I not think would one day come to pass – how rich I should be, how great, and, best of all, how beautiful! How kings and great people would flatter me, and make me grand presents; and how haughty I should be to some, and how gracious to others – perhaps very humble people; and how I’d amaze every one with all I knew, and they’d say, ‘Where did she learn this? How did she ever come to know that?’”

“And would that be happiness, Kate?”

“Would it not?”

“Then why not have the same dreams now?”

“Because I cannot – because they won’t come – because life is too full – because, as we eat before we are hungry, and lie down before we are tired, one’s thoughts never go high enough to soar above the pleasures that are around them. At least, I suppose that’s the reason; but I don’t care whether it is or not; there’s the carriage – I hear it coming. And now for such a jolly day in that glorious old garden, with the fountains and the statues, and

 
All the fine things in rock-work and crockery,
That make of poor Katun a solemn old mockery.
 

Do you know the rest?”

“No, I don’t. I never heard it.”

“It goes on, a something about

 
Flowers, the first gardener ne’er had in his Eden,
And dells so secluded, they ne’er saw the sun,
And sweet summer-houses so pleasant to read in,
With bright little jets-d’eau of eau-de-Cologne.
 

Isn’t that a Snob’s Paradise? – that’s what it’s called, Ada.” And away she went, singing a “Tyrol, tra la, la lira!” with a voice that seemed to ring with joy.

Ada called to her to come back; but she never heeded, and fled down the garden and was soon lost to view. Meanwhile, the carriage had reached the door, and as Ada rushed forward to greet it, she stepped back with dismay, for, instead of Sir Within’s spruce britschka, it was an old post-chaise, from which descended the well wrapt-up figure of Mr. M’Kinlay.

“Delighted to see you, Miss Ada; how you’ve grown since I was here – quite a young woman, I declare!” The last words were in soliloquy, for Ada, not aware that he had seen her, had betaken herself to flight to acquaint Mademoiselle of his arrival.

“Glad to see you again, Sir, in these parts,” said Rickards, as he caught up the smallest item of the luggage by way of assisting the traveller. “You had a pleasant journey, I hope, Sir?”

“So-so, Rickards – only so-so. It’s not the time of year one would choose to come down amongst the Welsh mountains; bitterly cold it was this morning early.”

“We’ll soon warm you, Sir; come into the dining-room. You haven’t had breakfast, I’m sure.”

“Nothing – not as much as a cup of tea – since four o’clock yesterday.”

“Dear me, Sir, I don’t know how you bear it. It’s what I remarked to Sir Gervais. I said, ‘There’s Mr. M’Kinlay, Sir,’ said I, ‘he goes through more than any young gentleman in the grouse season.’”

“Well, I’m not so very old, Rickards – eh?”

“Old! I should think not, Sir – in the very prime of life; and I declare, of an evening, Sir, with your white waistcoat on, I’d not guess you to be more than – let me see – ”

“Never mind the figure. Ah, this is comfortable; capital old room, and a good old-fashioned fire-place.”

While the lawyer held his half-frozen hands to the fire, Rickards drew a little table close to the hearth, and, with the dexterity of his calling, arranged the breakfast-things. “A hot steak in one moment, Sir, and a devilled kidney or two. Excuse me, Sir, but I’d say a little mulled claret would be better than tea; mulled, Sir, with just one table-spoonful of old brandy in it – Mr. Grenfell’s receipt.”

“No man should know better, Rickards.”

“Ah, Sir, always sharp – always ready you are, to be sure!” And Rickards had to wipe his eyes as he laughed at the repartee.

“And how do you get on here, Rickards?” said M’Kinlay, in a tone evidently meant to invite perfect confidence, and as evidently so interpreted, for, though the door was closed, Rickards went over and laid his hand on it, to assure himself of the fact, and then returned to the fireplace.

“Pretty well, Sir, pretty well. The governess will be meddling – these sort of people can’t keep from it – about the house expenses, and so on; but I don’t stand it, nohow. I just say, ‘This is the way we always do, Mam’sel. It’s just thirty-eight years I’m with the master’s father and himself.’ Isn’t that a pictur’ of a steak, Mr. M’Kinlay? Did you ever see sweeter fat than that, and the gravy in it, Sir? Mrs. Byles knows you, Sir, and does her best. You remember that game-pie, Sir, the last time you was here?”

“I think I do, and you told her what I said of it; but I don’t like what you say of the governess. She is meddlesome – interferes, eh?”

“Everywhere, Sir, wherever she can. With George about the hothouse plants and the melon-frames, with Mrs. Byles about the preserves, a thing my lady never so much as spoke of; and t’other day, Sir, what d’ye think she does, but comes and says to me, ‘Mr. Rickards, you have a cellar-book, haven’t you?’ Yes, ma’am,’ says I; ‘and if the young ladies wants it in the schoolroom to larn out of, I’ll bring it in with pleasure.’ Wasn’t that pretty home, Sir, eh?”

“And what did she say to that?”

“She whisked about this way” – here Mr. Rickards made a bold pirouette – “and said something in high Dutch that I feel sure wasn’t a blessing.”

“Tell me one thing, Rickards,” said the lawyer, in a lower tone, and with the air of a complete confidant. “What’s this little game she’s playing about that Irish girl, writing to my lady that she’s a genius, that she can do this, that, and t’other, and that you’ve only to show her a book, and she knows it from cover to cover?”

“And don’t you see what it is, Sir?” said Rickards, with one eye knowingly closed; “don’t you see it, Sir?”

“No, Rickards, I do not.”

“It’s all the way that little sarpent has of comin’ round her. Of all the creatures ever I seen, I never knew her equal for cunning. It ain’t any use knowing she’s a fox – not a bit of it, Sir – she’ll get round you all the same. It’s not an easy thing to get to the blind side of Mrs. Byles, I promise you. She’s a very knowledgeable woman, lived eleven years under a man-cook at Lord Wandsford’s, and knows jellies, and made French dishes as well as Monsieur Honoré himself. Well, Sir, that imp there winds her round her finger like a piece of packthread. She goes and says, ‘Byles’ – she doesn’t as much as Mrs. Byles her, the way my lady would – but ‘Byles,’ says she, ‘if ever I come to be a great lady and very rich, I’ll have you to keep my house, and you shall have your own nice sittin’-room, and your own maid to wait on you, and a hundred a year settled on you for your life.’ I vow it’s a fact, Sir, wherever she heard of such a thing, but she said ‘settled on you for life;’ and then, Sir, she’ll sit down and help her with the strawberry-jam, or the brandy-peaches, or whatever it is, and Mrs. Byles says there wouldn’t be her equal in all England, if she only took to be a still-room maid.”

“And can she humbug Mr. Rickards? Tell me that,” asked the lawyer, with the leer of an old cross-examiner.

“Well, I do think, Sir, she can’t do that. It’s not every one as could.”

“No, Rickards; you and I know how to sleep with one eye open. But what does she mean by all this cunning – what does she intend by it?”

“There’s what I can’t come at, nohow, Sir; for, as I say, what’s the good of plotting when you have everything at your hand? She hasn’t no need for it, Mr. M’Kinlay. She has the same treatment here as Miss Ada herself – it was the master’s orders.”

“It puzzles me, Rickards: I own it puzzles me,” said the lawyer, as, with his hands deep! in his pockets, he took a turn or two in the room.

“They say, Sir, it’s the way of them Irish,” said Rickards, with the air of a man enunciating a profound sentiment; but M’Kinlay either did not hear, or did not value the remark, for, after a pause, he said, “Its just possible, after all, Rickards, that it’s only a way she has. Don’t you think so?”

“I do not, Sir,” replied he, stoutly. “If there wasn’t more than that in it, she wouldn’t go on as I have seen her do, when she thought she was all alone.”

“How so? What do you mean?”

“Well, you see, Sir, there’s a laurel hedge in the garden, that goes along by the wall where the peach-trees are, and that’s her favourite walk, and I’ve watched her when she was there by herself, and it was as good as any play to see her.”

“In what respect?”

“She’d be making believe all sorts of things to herself – how that she was a fine lady showing the grounds to a party of visitors, telling them how she intended to build something here and throw down something there, what trees she’d plant in one place, and what an opening for a view she’d made in another. You’d not believe your ears if you heard how glibly she’d run on about plants and shrubs and flowers. And then suddenly she’d change, and pretend to call her maid, and tell her to fetch her another shawl or her gloves; or she’d say, ‘Tell George I shall not ride to-day, perhaps I’ll drive out in the evening.’ And that’s the way she’d go on till she heard the governess coming, and then, just as quick as lightning, you’d hear her in her own voice again, as artless as any young creature you ever listened to.”

“I see – I see,” said M’Kinlay, with a sententious air and look, as though he read the whole case, and saw her entire disposition revealed before him like a plan. “A shrewd minx in her own way, but a very small way it is. Now, Rickards, perhaps you’d tell Miss Heinzleman that I’m here – of course, not a word about what we’ve been talking over.”

“You couldn’t think it, Sir.”

“Not for a moment, Rickards. I could trust to your discretion like my own.”

When Mr. M’Kinlay was left alone, he drew forth some letters from his pocket, and sought out one in a small envelope, the address of which was in a lady’s writing. It was a yery brief note from Miss Courtenay to himself, expressing her wish that he could find it convenient to run down, if only for a day, to Wales, and counsel Mademoiselle Heinzleman on a point of some difficulty respecting one of her pupils. The letter was evidently written in terms to be shown to a third party, and implied a case in which the writer’s interest was deep and strong, but wherein she implicitly trusted to the good judgment of her friend, Mr. M’Kinlay, for the result.

“You will hear,” wrote she, “from Mademoiselle Heinzleman the scruples she has communicated to myself and learn from her that all the advantages derivable from my brother-in-law’s project have been already realised, but that henceforth difficulties alone may be apprehended, so that your consideration will be drawn at once to the question whether this companionship is further necessary, or indeed advisable.” She went on to state that if Sir Gervais had not told her Mr. M’Kinlay would be obliged to go down to the cottage for certain law papers he required, she would have scarcely ventured on imposing the present charge upon him, but that she felt assured, in the great regard he had always expressed for the family, of his ready forgiveness.

A small loose slip, marked “Strictly private and confidential,” was enclosed within the note, the words of which ran thus: “You will see that you must imply to Mademoiselle H. that she has written to me, in the terms and the spirit of my letter to her, and in this way pledge her to whatever course you mean to adopt. This will be easy, for she is a fool.

“I cannot believe that all the interest she assumes to take in K. is prompted by the girl’s qualities, or her aptitude to learn, and I gravely suspect she has my brother-in-law’s instructions on this head. This plot, for plot it is, I am determined to thwart, and at any cost. The girl must be got rid of, sent to a school, or if no better way offer, sent home again. See that you manage this in such a way as will not compromise yourself, nor endanger you in the esteem of

“G. C.”

This last line he re-read before he enclosed the slip in his pocket-book, muttered to himself the words, “endanger you in the esteem of Georgina Courtenay.”