Lacey was excited and anxious, but he knew his father better than to put even the most veiled question to him in my presence.
"All right, sir. Austin's been looking after me first-rate."
I could not be mistaken; a touch of ownership over me—the hint of a right to approve of me—came into Fillingford's voice. I seemed to feel myself adopted as a retainer—or, at least, my past services to one of the family acknowledged.
"I'm sure Mr. Austin is always most kind."
The impression was subtle, but it confirmed, more than anything that had yet happened, my certainty of Jenny's answer. I had further confirmation the next moment. He stood on the edge of the terrace, his arm through his son's, and looked over the view.
"A fine position!" he said. "If it had been the fashion to build on the top of a hill three centuries ago, we should have put the house here, I suppose, instead of selling to the Dormers. It was part of our land originally, you know, Mr. Austin." He pulled himself up with a laugh. "A feudal lord's reminiscences! We do well enough if we can keep what we've got nowadays—without regretting what we used to have. Come along, Amyas, or your aunt will have given us up for tea!"
He had sought to correct the impression he had given—to withdraw the idea implicit in his words about Breysgate Priory; yet the withdrawal seemed formal, made in deference to an obligation rather than really effective or important. I was sure that, as he trod Breysgate park that evening, he trod the soil as, in his own mind, already part of the Fillingford domains. The most reserved of men cannot but tell something; only a god or a brute, as the philosopher has it, can be absolutely unrevealing. If Fillingford could have succeeded in attaining to that—and I have no doubt that he tried—his son would have spoiled the mystery. Familiarity taught him to read more clearly his father's visage. His face beamed with exultation; as he had "wished the governor luck with all his heart," now, without question, the moment I was out of hearing, he wished him joy.
I went in to Jenny, without stopping to think whether she had bidden me come or not. I could not keep away; it even seemed to be something like hypocrisy to keep away now on the pretext that I had not been expressly summoned. She had told me that she liked me to stay—as "somebody to catch her if she fell." That was, surely, at least a permission to be near her?
She was alone, save for Loft who was setting out the tea-tray in his usual deft, speedy, deliberate way. She sat in the middle of the sofa, looking straight in front of her. But she spoke to me directly I came in, while Loft and the footman were still in the room.
"You've just missed Lord Fillingford. Or did you see him as he went away?