Scarcely an hour later, Dassett was as nearly put out of countenance as it was possible for a person of his dignity and experience to be by the arrival in Berkeley Square of a second post chaise. This, also a hack vehicle, was drawn by four sweating horses, and was caked in mud up to the axles. A number of trunks and portmanteaus were piled on the back, and on the roof. A soberly dressed individual first jumped down and ran up the steps of the Ombersley mansion to set the bell pealing. By the time the door had been opened by a footman, and Dassett stood ready to receive guests upon the threshold, a much larger figure had descended in a leisurely way from the chaise, and, after tossing a couple of guineas to the postilions, and exchanging a jovial word with them, trod unhurriedly up the steps to the door.
Dassett, who afterward described his condition to the housekeeper as fairly flummoxed, found himself unable to do more than stammer, “G — good evening, sir! We — we were not expecting you, sir!”
“Wasn’t expecting myself,” said Sir Horace, stripping off his gloves. “Devilish good voyage! Not a day above two months at sea! Tell your people to see all that lumber of mine carried into the house! Her ladyship well?”
Dassett, helping him to struggle out of his caped greatcoat, said that her ladyship was as well as could be looked for.
“That’s good,” said Sir Horace, walking over to a large mirror, and bestowing an expert touch or two upon his cravat. “How’s my daughter?”
“I — I believe Miss Sophy to be enjoying excellent health, sir!”
“Ay, she always does. Where is she?”
“I regret to inform you, sir, that Miss Sophy has gone out of town,” replied Dassett, who would have been pleased to have discussed the mystery of Sophy’s disappearance with almost anyone else.
“Oh? Well, I’ll see her ladyship,” said Sir Horace, displaying, in the butler’s opinion, an unnatural want of interest in his only child’s whereabouts.
Dassett took him up to the drawing room and left him there while he went in search of her ladyship’s maid. Amabel having just dropped off to sleep it was not many minutes before Lady Ombersley came hurrying into the drawing room and almost cast herself upon her brother’s manly bosom. “Oh, my dear Horace!” she exclaimed. “How glad I am to see you! How sorry to think — But you are safely home!”