"He will be glad enough to hear, miss, that someone else is going to do something. He says the Colonel is so irritable because he has found out so little that there is no bearing with him."
"The Colonel is trying," Netta laughed. "As you know, he comes here two or three times a week and puts himself into such rages that, as he stamps up and down the room, I expect to hear a crash and to find that the dining-room ceiling has fallen down. He is a thoroughly kind-hearted man, but is a dreadful specimen of what an English gentleman may come to after he has had the command of an Indian regiment for some years, and been accustomed to have his will obeyed in everything. It is very bad for a man."
"It is a good deal worse for his servant, miss," Tom Roberts said, in a tone of deep sympathy for his comrade. "I doubt whether I could have stood it myself; but though Andrew expresses his feelings strong sometimes, I know that if you offered him a good place, even in Buckingham Palace, he would not leave the Colonel."
Two days later Netta heard that the girl in Jermyn Street had joyfully accepted the offer, and had that morning told her master that she had heard that she was wanted badly at home, and that a cousin of hers would be up in a day or two, and would, she was sure, be very glad to take her place. The master agreed to give her a trial, if she looked a clean and tidy girl.
"I shall be clean and tidy, Roberts; and I am sure I shall do no injustice to her recommendation."
Roberts shook his head. The matter was, to his mind, far too serious to be joked about, and he almost felt as if he were acting in a treasonable sort of way in aiding to carry out such a project.
On the following Monday Hilda, on coming down to breakfast, found a note on the table. She opened it in haste, seeing that it was in Netta's handwriting, and her eyes opened in surprise and almost dismay as she read:
"My Darling Hilda: I told you that I had a plan. Well, I am off to carry it out. It is of no use your asking what it is, or where I am going. You will hear nothing of me until I return to tell you whether I have failed or succeeded. Aunt knows what I am going to do."
Hilda at once ran upstairs to Miss Purcell's room.
"Where has Netta gone?" she exclaimed. "Her letter has given me quite a turn. She says that you know; but I feel sure that it is something very foolish and rash."