“Have you seen her?”
“Only for a moment or two, poor thing; but I never did see such eyes or such a wonderful sad smile as she tried to thank us with. Medlicott is ready to do anything for her husband’s sake; I am sure anyone would do the same for hers. To get such a look is something to remember!”
“Well done, Duke!” ejaculated Cecil under his breath, for he had never seen his senior so animated or so enthusiastic. “Then you mean to stay, and let Medlicott look after them?”
“Of course I do,” said Fordham, in a much more decided tone than he had used in the morning. “I’m not going to do anything so barbarous as to leave them to some German practitioner; and when we are here, I don’t see why they should have advice out from home—not half so good probably.”
“You’re a brick, Duke,” uttered Cecil; and though Fordham hated slang, he smiled at the praise.
“And now, Duke, be a good fellow, and give me some clothes. That brute Reeves has not brought me in one rag.”
“Really it is hardly worth while. It is nearly eight o’clock, and I don’t know where your portmanteau was put. Shall I get you a book?”
“No; but if you’d get me a pen and ink, I want to write to mother.”
Such a desire was not too frequent in Cecil, and Fordham was glad enough to promote it, bringing in his own neat apparatus, with only a mild entreaty that his favourite pen might be well treated, and the sheets respected. He had written his own letter of explanation of his first act of independence, and he looked with some wonder at his brother’s rapid writing, not without fear that some sudden pressure for a foolish debt might have been the result of his tete-a-tete with his dangerous friend. Cecil’s letters were too apt to be requests for money or confessions of debts, and if this were the case, what would be Mrs. Evelyn’s view of the conduct of the whole party in disregarding her wishes?
Had he been with his mother, he would have probably been called into consultation over the letter, but he was forced to remain without the privilege here offered to the reader:—