Miss Beccles looked undecided but Carlyon interposed to assure her that he should send Mrs. Cheviot upstairs within a few minutes. So after placing the smelling salts within reach and begging Elinor not to forget to finish her draft, she flitted away.
“Well, Mrs. Cheviot?” Carlyon said, walking over to the fire and stooping to warm his hands at it. “You have had rather a disagreeable experience, I am afraid, and I am persuaded you blame me for it.”
“What should put such a notion as that into your head?” marveled the widow. “When I understand you have been in London since yesterday!”
“Oho! That is it, is it? But it seemed to me expedient that I should go to London, and you will give me credit for having made the best possible speed back to you.”
“I shall give you credit for nothing. I dare say you went to be measured for a pair of boots!”
“No, but if I told you my object you would think it trifling, I dare say.” He straightened himself and said, smiling, “Are you very vexed with me for leaving you, ma’am?”
Mrs. Cheviot felt her color rising and made haste to reply,”
“Vexed! No, indeed! When you were so thoughtful as to inform Nicky that you believed Mr. Francis Cheviot to be a dangerous man! I am sure I ought to be very much obliged to you for the warning, arid it must be quite my own fault that I now have a bump as big as a hen’s egg on my head!”
“It is a pity Nicky cannot learn to hold his tongue,” he remarked. “I do not anticipate that Cheviot will be a danger to you, ma’am.”
Mrs. Cheviot recruited herself with another sip of her draft. “Of course I have dreamed the whole!” she said. “I was not hit on the head at all!”