"You know I'm your friend," Mrs. Grant said. "I'd do anything I could to help you, but you see how it is with us here. We shall never be close friends with Lady Brent; I don't think she wants it. But she's kind and well-disposed towards us. I couldn't run the risk of setting her against us, unless I were quite certain that—I mean quite certain of my ground. It wouldn't be fair to my husband. It would make all the difference to us here if we were not on good terms with her. Have you told me everything? Why should she think you might get into mischief?"
She put this aside lightly. "Oh, there's nothing in that. It's only what she'd say. She'd say anything. But I see I ought not to ask you. No, it wouldn't be fair to bring you into it. She'd have it up against you; you're quite right. I tell you this, Mrs. Grant; when Harry comes of age—or before that, when he goes to Sandhurst—I'm off. No more of this for me. I shall snap my fingers at her. But of course you've got to stay here. No, I'll tackle her myself, and see if I can't get my own way for once."
She sprang up. "I'll go and do it now," she said. "No time like the present."
She laughed, and kissed Mrs. Grant. "Good-bye, dear," she said. "It does me good to talk to you; you're so understanding. And it does me good to have you here—you and your nice kind clever husband and your sweet children. Ah, if I'd had a bit of real family life with my poor boy!—it might have been here or anywhere; I shouldn't have cared where it was—it would all have been very different. Now I'll go and tackle the old dragon while I'm fresh for it. Good-bye, dear; I'll go out through the garden."
She went out by the window, and stopped to look at the sleeping baby as she crossed the lawn, smiling and making a little motion of the hand towards Mrs. Grant as she did so. Then she disappeared behind the shrubbery.
Mrs. Grant laid down her work and went to refresh herself with a look at the baby. As she turned back, her husband came out of his room, which was next to the drawing-room and also opened on to the garden.
His face was serious. "I didn't know you had Mrs. Brent with you," he said. "I've had Wilbraham. They're all at loggerheads up at the Castle, Ethel. I don't quite know what to do about it. I don't want to get up against Lady Brent; but——"
She told him of Mrs. Brent's prospective revolt. "She asked me to talk to her," she said. "But I said the same as you do. We don't want to get up against her. What is the trouble with Mr. Wilbraham?"
"Much the same as with Mrs. Brent apparently. He's fed up with it too. He wants to get away."
"What, for always?"