‘I am sure she is very happy, my Lord, to have been of service,’ said her mother, with a simper.
Mr. Deyncourt, to relieve the tension of feeling, said, ‘Miss Rollstone was reading the letter about Mr. Morton’s adventures. Would you not like her to begin again?’
And while Rose obeyed, Lord Northmoor was able to extract his cheque-book from his pocket-book, and as Rose paused, to say—
‘I have a debt of which my nephew reminds me. Miss Rollstone furnished the means for his
journey. Will you let me fill this up? This can be repaid,’ he added, with a smile, ‘the rest, never.’
Mr. Rollstone might have been distressed at the venture on which his daughter’s savings had gone; but he was perfectly happy and triumphant now, except that, even more than Mrs. Morton, he suffered from the idea of the Honourable Michael being exposed to the contamination of a workhouse, and was shocked at his Lordship’s thinking it would have been worse for him to be with the Rattler. Then, hastily looking at his watch, Lord Northmoor asked when the post went out, and hearing there was but half an hour to spare, begged Mr. Deyncourt to let him lose no time by giving him the wherewithal to write to his wife.
‘She would miss a note and be uneasy,’ he said. ‘Yet I hardly know what I dare tell her. Only not mourning paper!’ he added, with an exultant smile.
In the curate’s room he wrote—
‘Dearest Wife,—
‘I have been out all day, and have only a moment to say that I am quite well, and trust to have some most thankworthy news for you. Don’t be uneasy if you do not hear to-morrow.—Your own
‘Frank.’
There was still time to scribble—