"But why?" I demanded.
"He thinks there's something between him and you."
"But there isn't."
"I should hope not; but, evidently, Strangways has made him think—"
"Oh no, he hasn't, Hugh. Mr. Strangways is not that kind of man. Mr. Grainger has some other reason for wanting me there, but I can't think what it is."
"Then I shouldn't go till I knew," Hugh counseled, moodily.
But I did. I went the next week. Larry Strangways made the arrangements, and, after a fortnight under Miss Davis's instructions, I found myself alone.
It was not so trying as I feared, though it was monotonous. It was monotonous because there was so little to do. I was there each morning at half past nine. From one to two I had an hour for lunch. At six I came away. On Saturdays I had the afternoon. It was a little like being a prisoner, but a prisoner in a palace, a prisoner who is well paid.
The place consisted of one big, handsome room, some sixty feet by thirty, resembling the libraries of great houses I had seen abroad. That in this case it was detached from the dwelling was, I suppose, a matter of architectural convenience. Book-shelves lined the walls right up to the cornice. The dull reds and browns and blues and greens of the bindings carried out the mellow effects of the Oriental rugs on the floor. Under the shelves there were cupboards, some of them empty, others stocked with portfolios of prints, European and Japanese. There were no pictures, but a few large pieces of old porcelain and faïence, Persian, Spanish, and Chinese, stood on the mantelpiece and tables. For the rest, the furnishings consisted of a bust or two, a desk or two, and some decorative tables and chairs.
My chief objection to the life was its seeming pointlessness. I was hard at work doing nothing. The number of visitors was negligible. Once during the autumn an old gentleman brought some engravings to compare with similar examples in Mr. Grainger's collection; once a lady student of Shakespeare came to examine his early editions; perhaps as often as twice a week some wandering tourist in New York would enter and stare vacantly, and go as he arrived. To while away the time I read and wrote and did knitting and fancy-work, and at half past four every day, as regularly as the hands of the clock came round, I solemnly had my tea. It was very good tea, with cake and bread and butter in the orthodox style, and was brought by Mrs. Daly, the motherly old Irish caretaker of the house, who stumped in and stumped out, giving me, while she stayed, a good deal of detail as to her "sky-attic" nerves and swollen "varikiss" veins.