“I have not the faintest idea,” she assured him. “Nature never meant me for a detective. I have too little imagination.”
There was a brief silence. The young lady began to make preparations for departure.
“Tell me,” her companion ventured; “now that I am settling down here, I should like to be neighbourly. It is, of course, impossible for Madame to come and see me—would it be possible for me to call upon her?”
“In a general way,” she replied, after a moment’s hesitation, “I should have told you at once that it was altogether impossible. Madame detests visitors—the outer gate is generally kept locked as a hint—but curiously enough, she has shown the utmost interest in your coming. She will bombard me with questions when I return. Unless what I say satisfies her, it is very possible that she may consent to receive your visit. Although,” she added, “you won’t get much amusement out of it.”
“In any case,” he said, “I hope before long that Madame may require some other trifling service and that you will again be her ambassadress.”
She left him, vouchsafing only the most casual of farewells, and passing round the corner of the house without a backward glance. Mr. Johnson watched her every step. An ordinary young woman without a doubt, wearing ordinary clothes, saying ordinary things, and with an unusual gift for concealment. Yet there was something in her very reticence which had its allurement. Mr. Johnson, who was not a profound psychologist, although he had always understood the men with whom he had had to deal, had a flash of inspiration. She was ordinary, just as she was reticent—because she was, by temperament, or circumstance, intensely self-possessive. He came to the conclusion, as he returned to his unaccustomed pursuit, and fluffed mashie shot after mashie shot, that there existed a Miss Besant at present entirely unrevealed.
At precisely half-past three o’clock that afternoon there occurred what was looked upon almost as a pageant in the village. With great ceremony the very fine gates leading to the Hall were thrown open by the lodge keeper, and, in the small old-fashioned brougham which only left the Ballaston stables three or four times a year, drawn by a couple of dark bay horses, whose sides shone like satin and whose harness glittered from every point of view in iridescent splendour, Mr. Henry Ballaston, on behalf of the family, came to call upon the newcomer at the Great House. From the lodge gates onward the progress of the seldom seen lesser autocrat of the village and neighbourhood was something like a royal procession. The tradesmen hastened to their shop windows to perform their salutes, the roadmender stood, bare-headed, looking downward as one receiving a blessing. The solitary occupant of the brougham sat with expressionless face, his hand raised all the time to his hat. It was impressive and distinctly a survival.
Arrived at the somewhat inhospitable-looking gates of solid oak which formed the entrance to the Great House, the footman sprang to the ground and drew from its resting place amongst the ivy the knob of the seldom-used bell. The gates were thrown open. Morton received the visitor at the front door and escorted him to where his master lay stretched in a basket chair under a cedar tree at the farthest corner of the lawn.
“Mr. Henry Ballaston, sir,” he announced.