"Have I?" demanded uncertainly the thick, heavy voice of the old man.
"Yes, you have—on the top of your other coat. If I don't look after you I shall get myself into a row!... Here, let me put your fist in the armhole. It's your blooming glove that stops it.... There! Now, up with you, grandad!... All right! I've got you. I sha'n't drop you."
A door snapped to; then another. The car shot violently forward, with shrieks and a huge buzzing noise, and leaped up the slope of the street. Rachel, still in the porch, could see Mr. Batchgrew's head wagging rather helplessly from side to side, just above the red speck of the tail-lamp. Then the whole vision was swiftly blotted out, and the warning shrieks of the invisible car grew fainter on the way to Red Cow. It pleased Rachel to think of the old man being casually bullied and shaken by John's Ernest.
She leaned forward and gazed down the street, not up it. When she turned into the house Mrs. Maldon was descending the stairs, which, being in a line with the lobby, ended opposite the front door. Judging by the fixity of the old lady's features, Rachel decided that she was not yet quite pardoned for the slight she had put upon the memory of her employer. So she smiled pleasantly.
"Don't close the front door, dear," said Mrs. Maldon stiffly. "There's some one there."
Rachel looked round. She had actually, in sheer absent-mindedness or negligence or deafness, been shutting the door in the face of the telegraph-boy!
"Oh, dear! I do hope—!" Mrs. Maldon muttered as she hastily tugged at the envelope.
Having read the message, she passed it on to Rachel, and at the same time forgivingly responded to her smile. The excitement of the telegram had sufficed to dissipate Mrs. Maldon's trifling resentment.
Rachel read—
"Train hour late. Julian."