“She’s gone by, auntie.”
“Ah, with all her fuss, she daren’t keep up the acquaintance.”
“She has turned back and gone in, auntie.”
“Oh, very well, just as she likes; it is no business of mine.”
Annie, the innocent, was quite right, for Mrs Barclay had walked by the Denvilles’, and then stopped short, indignant with herself; turned back and given a good bold rap at the door, to which Isaac, who looked discontented and strange, replied, and said, before he was asked:
“Not at home.”
“Now don’t you talk nonsense to me, young man,” said Mrs Barclay, “because—”
“My master and mistress are—not—at—”
Isaac began to drag his works towards the last, for Mrs Barclay was rummaging in her reticule for a half-crown, but could only find a good old-fashioned crown, which she slipped into the footman’s hand.
To a man-servant who was beginning to look upon his arrears of wages as doubtful, a crown-piece was a coin not to be despised, and he took it and smiled.