"I don't know that we need trouble you, Mr. Greenwood."
"I have come with some news respecting the family." As he said this he managed to assume the old look, and stood as though he had never moved from the place since he had last been in the room.
"Do sit down, Mr. Greenwood. What news?"
"Mr. George Roden, the clerk in the Post Office—"
But she was not going to have the tidings repeated to her by him, so as to give him any claim to gratitude for having brought them. "You mean the Duca di Crinola!"
"Oh," exclaimed Mr. Greenwood.
"I have heard all that, Mr. Greenwood."
"That the Post Office clerk is an Italian nobleman?"
"It suited the Italian nobleman for a time to be a Post Office clerk. That is what you mean."
"And Lady Frances is to be allowed—"