“Have you seen your sister this morning?” she demanded,
“No, she is not up yet. She was out until the small hours, at some ball or other, and has doubtless overslept.”
“Mr Ravenscar, I have this instant received this letter,” she interrupted him, holding out Mr Kennet’s note to him. “It was brought round to the house late last night, but I never had it until this morning! I have come instantly—you must believe that I would have come last night if I had known! Please read it at once! It is vital that you should be in possession of all the facts without another moment’s loss of time!”
He took the letter from her. “I will read it, but will you not sit down, Miss Grantham? Let me first get you a glass of wine. You are dreadfully pale!”
“No, no, I want nothing, I thank you! Only read that letter I beg of you!” she said, sinking down on to the sofa.
He looked at her with a good deal of concern, but as she merely signed to him to open the sheet of paper he was holding, he did so, and read Mr Kennet’s startling message.
He raised his eyes when he had come to the end of the letter and fixed them on Miss Grantham’s face, saying in an odd voice: “Why have you brought me this, ma’am?”
“Good God, do you not understand?” she cried. “Your sister has run off with him, believing that he means to marry her! It is all a plot to get money from you! I came at once, because it is my fault! It was at my aunt’s house that she met him, but I never dreamed—but there is no excusing my part in this! I said I did not care what Lucius might do to you! I said I hoped he would ruin you. But indeed, indeed I never meant such wicked mischief as this!” She stopped, trying to regain command over her voice, which was shaking pitiably. “He won’t hurt her,” she managed to say. “He is not as bad as that! You see he says that he does not mean her any harm, but only to hold her to ransom. You must trust me, sir! I can help you, and I will. Silas knows all the places where he might be found. You must do nothing. You must leave it to me! It would be fatal if you were to meet Lucius! The story would be bound to leak out, and whatever happens no one must ever know the truth! Once Silas has found them, I can do the rest. I give you my word Lucius will not dare to breathe a word of it to a soul. If he does, I shall swear that there is no word of truth in it, but that Miss Ravenscar was all the time in my company. But he will not speak! I know things about him that would ruin him if I chose to divulge them, and I will do so if ever he should dare to try to extort money out of you by threatening to publish the story to the world! Oh, do please trust me, sir! I know that none of it would ever have happened if I had not refused to give Adrian up at the outset, just to punish you, and you must, you must let me help you now!”
Mr Ravenscar, who had listened to this speech with remarkable composure, now laid Mr Kennet’s letter aside, and sat down beside Miss Grantham, calmly possessing himself of both her hands, and holding them in a firm clasp. “Deb, my darling, there’s no need for you to distress yourself like this! Don’t tremble so, my poor girl! Arabella is not such a fool as to be taken in by a man of Kennet’s kidney.”
“Oh, don’t you understand?” she cried, in an agony of impatience. “He can be very fascinating to a girl of her age! He—”