"Well, Miss----"
"Answer Yes or No, Susan, straight out. Have you let Gibson think that, if he gets on, some day you will marry him?"
Susan's eyes filled with tears. Her cheeks burned red.
"Come, Susan, tell me."
She broke into weeping.
"Oh, no, Miss, no!" she moaned between her sobs. "Not Gibson. Truly, Miss. I've never said a single word to encourage Gibson."
"Very good," I said. "But don't go on like that. There's nothing to cry about. If you can't be sensible, we must talk about it some other time."
I confess that, for a minute or two, I had indulged a hope that Gibson would prove to be Susan's favoured lover, and that, accordingly, Lord Ruddington's monstrous infatuation could be nipped in the bud. And when my hope was found to be groundless, I felt more than a little nettled. I foresee endless annoyance and inestimable losses of time and temper over this unheard-of madness of my preposterous young neighbour. We've been told for years that we shall see wonders when Lord Ruddington comes to live at the Towers; and, seeing he's only been here a week, I must admit he hasn't lost much time.
When Susan stopped crying she was less tractable. I suppose she resented my catechising her about Gibson. After all, I shouldn't have liked it myself. As soon as she was dry-eyed, she became a little more dry-hearted, and a good deal more dry-witted as well. She was more defiant, less dependent: much more the prospective lady of the Towers and much less the actual lady's-maid at the Grange. I noticed this in her answer to my first remark after her tears had ceased to flow.
"Susan," I said, "this is a matter which won't be any the worse of a night's delay. I will sleep on it, and so must you. Understand, I say sleep. I don't mean that you're to lie awake and let it worry you. We shall write Lord Ruddington a better answer to-morrow than we can to-day. Meanwhile, it won't do him any harm to be kept waiting a few hours longer."