"Yes; a cab won't kill her, and it is less easily followed than a carriage."
"And where shall we go?"
"There is a train to Southampton at four, and the boat sails for Jersey at half-past six; you will be in Jersey the next morning, and there is a boat goes on to St. Malo, almost at once. You can go direct from one boat to the other,—that is, if she has strength and courage." After that, who will say that Lady Monk was not a devoted aunt?
"That would do excellently well," said the enraptured Burgo.
"She will have difficulty in getting away from me, out of the house. Of course I shall say nothing about it, and shall know nothing about it. She had better tell her coachman to drive somewhere to pick some one up, and to return;—out somewhere to Tyburnia, or down to Pimlico. Then she can leave me, and go out on foot, to where you have the cab. She can tell the hall-porter that she will walk to her carriage. Do you understand?" Burgo declared that he did understand.
"You must call on her, and make your way in, and see her, and arrange all this. It must be a Thursday, because of the boats." Then she made inquiry about his money, and took from him the notes which he had, promising to return them, with something added, on the Thursday morning; but he asked, with a little whine, for a five-pound note, and got it. Burgo then told her about the travelling-bags and the stockings, and they were quite pleasant and confidential. "Bid her come in a stout travelling-dress," said Lady Monk. "She can wear some lace or something over it, so that the servants won't observe it. I will take no notice of it." Was there ever such an aunt?
After this, Burgo left his aunt, and went away to his club, in a state of most happy excitement.