"A Mr. Stafford, you say, on the drainage works," she wrote. "I knew Staffords of Old Hall in Worcestershire, very poor people, had lost everything. Don't judge hastily; these drains may be for home defence."
Psyche gave Gheena the letter; Miss Freyne read it carefully.
"And the new car is coming—when?" she said to Basil Stafford.
"Next week, I think. What's that, Miss Delorme? Did we live at Old Hall in Worcester? Yes, that was our place. It's let. My mother's in London. She was in a sky-scraping flat before her operation, but now I've taken a nice house for her, and she won't leave for any Zeps. It's so hard to get a chauffeur, two of hers have gone. I gave her a car last June."
Gheena's lips came together. Riches had sprung up swiftly for this young man.
Basil Stafford left, looking tired, lines round his pleasant mouth.
The scratch pack hunted a fox with leisurely determination next day from Green Gorse Hill and through a nice hunt. Psyche rode close to Darby. She got in his way several times; she chattered at moments when she should have been silent; but the small face was so rapturously happy that he said nothing. Dearest George remonstrated fussily with his guest.
"You must keep quiet at the checks, Mona," he said, "and let Darby alone. He is my colleague, remember, a Master, as I am."
"He rides in front, and do you stay behind to make the lazy dogs keep up?" asked Psyche with interest. "Is that why there are two Masters?"
Amid a clarity of silence, broken only by Darby choking, George Freyne rode away.