[CHAPTER XVIII.]
SOUNDINGS.
Captain Derinzy did not experience so much satisfaction as he had anticipated from Mr. George Wainwright's visit to the Tower. On the first night of his arrival, his guest had listened to him with the greatest patience and apparent delight. The Captain had told all his old stories, repeated his bon mots--which were very brilliant some dozen years before, but had lost a little of their glitter and piquancy--and had aired the two subjects on which he was strongest--his delight in London life, and his disgust at the place in which he was then compelled to vegetate--to his own entire satisfaction.
He had hoped for frequent renewals of these pleasant confabulations during George Wainwright's stay; but the next morning Paul told his father that he and his friend had matters of business to talk over; and although George seemed willing, and even anxious, to give up portions of his time occasionally to his host, he was so much in requisition by Paul, by Annette, and even by Mrs. Stothard, that the poor Captain found himself left as much as usual to his own devices, and wandered about the beach and the cliffs, cursing his fate and his exile as loudly as ever. But while he was thus excluded from the general councils, a series of explanations seemed to be going on among the other members of the household.
"I want to speak to you, Martha," said Mrs. Derinzy, on the afternoon of the day after the conversation last recorded had taken place. "I have been thinking over what you said this morning, and I want you to be more explicit about it."
"About what portion of it?" asked Mrs. Stothard.
"Well, about all; but more particularly what you said about my only having chosen to give you half confidences. What did you mean by that?"
"Exactly what I said. You're a clever woman, Mrs. Derinzy, but you have made a great mistake in imagining that you could make me a fellow-conspirator with you in a plot----"
"Conspirator! plot!" cried Mrs. Derinzy, interrupting.
"Exactly. A fellow-conspirator in a plot," said Mrs. Stothard calmly--"I use the words advisedly--and yet only tell me a portion of your intentions."