The housekeeper held open the sitting-room door and Cecily walked in and sat down with an air of relief.
“My father has been ill, Mrs. Wye. That is why he has not been down here lately. He is much better now and I am hoping to take him to the sea soon to convalesce. In the meantime he wants some papers from the desk in his bedroom and I have come to fetch them.”
“I am very sorry to hear Mr. Hoyle has been ill, miss,” and the woman really did look concerned. “We have had several people here asking after him of late and there is a lot of letters. But I never know where to forward them. I take it Mr. Hoyle will have been in a nursing-home, miss?”
“Er—oh, yes.” Cecily began to feel that even this woman might want to know too much. “Perhaps you would get me a cup of tea, Mrs. Wye,” she went on. “I hadn't time for lunch before I started and though I had some tea at the station it wasn't up to much. It never is at stations, somehow.”
“You are right there, miss,” Mrs. Wye agreed. “And is the master out of the nursing-home now, might I ask, miss?”
“Oh, yes. He is with friends,” Cecily said vaguely. Her colour deepened as she spoke.
The housekeeper's little eyes watched her curiously. “Perhaps you would give me an address I could forward the letters to, miss.”
“Oh, of course!” Cecily got up. She could not sit here to be badgered by this woman who she began to feel was inimical to her. “I will get the things my father wants,” she went on. “For I must catch an early train back. I do not want to be away longer than necessary.”
She went upstairs to the front bedroom which she knew to be her father's. It was spotlessly clean and tidy, but it had the bare look of a room that has been unoccupied for a long time. The desk stood on a small table near the window. Cecily had the key, and the envelope for which she had come down was lying just at the top. A long rather thin envelope inscribed 11260. Doubled up it just fitted into Cecily's handbag. She pushed it in and shut it with a snap. Then she sat down in a basket-work chair near the open window. She really could not start back without some rest, and she was not anxious to encounter Mrs. Wye again. As she sat there her thoughts went back to Tony's letter; and though she told herself that nothing could come of it the recollection of his love seemed to fall like sunshine over her, cheering and enveloping her.
She was feeling more herself when her eyes mechanically straying past the little garden with its ordered paths and flower-beds fixed themselves on the road that ran beyond. Suddenly they focused themselves upon an object nearly opposite the cottage gate. Slowly the colour ebbed from her cheeks and lips, her eyes grew wide and frightened, the hands lying on her lap began to twitch and twine themselves nervously together.