“I should say, sir, let him come up into the drawing-room, where just yourself, James, and I shall be. Then I leave it to you to state the facts. I would tell Miss Heathcote and Katie that he is coming; but I would not let Frank know anything about it. Keep him out of the way somehow, else we shall have a violent scene. Frank is an easy-going man, and I never saw him but once or twice fairly roused; but when he is, Captain Bradshaw, he is terrible, and strong as he is, the whole of us together would hardly keep him from nearly killing Fred Bingham if he once got near him.”
“Serve him right too,” Captain Bradshaw muttered to himself. “Well, Prescott, arrange it as you like.”
Alice and Kate were accordingly warned; but Prescott had some difficulty in persuading the latter to agree that Frank should be kept in the dark, her sentiments being entirely in accordance with those of Captain Bradshaw in the matter of horsewhipping. At last, however, she reluctantly gave way to the arguments of Alice and Prescott, and agreed to keep the matter from Frank. It had been arranged that nothing should be said to James until the morning, as they did not wish to excite him.
That evening, as Carry and Alice came together out of the room of the invalid, Alice said, “Please come to my room, Miss Walker, for a moment; I want to speak to you alone. I think it right to tell you, in order that you may leave earlier than usual, so as to avoid any risk of a meeting, that he, you understand who I mean, will be here to-morrow at one o’clock.”
Carry turned a little pale. “I am not afraid to meet him, Miss Heathcote. It is not I who have to be ashamed, now I know him as he is. My only shame is that I should ever have loved him, ever have been deceived by him. I have long ceased to think of him as anything to me. Now I despise him utterly. Thank you all the same, Miss Heathcote, but I am not afraid of meeting him;” and with an air of pride, which sat strangely upon her usually quiet figure, Carry Walker went home to her father.
The next day, at a quarter to one, Alice Heathcote—for Kate had obstinately refused to have any hand whatever in getting her husband out of the way—said, suddenly, “By the way, Frank; I want you to do a commission for me.”
“Certainly, Alice, what is it?”
“I wish you would go down to the music-shop at the other end of the esplanade, and ask if they have got the ‘Isabella Waltzes.’”
“Very well, Alice; but won’t this afternoon do? We can all walk down there together.”
“I particularly want them to try after lunch, Frank. I have a particular reason.”