“Yes, miss, I’ve often thought the same. It comes hard on a gentleman like Sir Peter to be as he is.”
“Winkfield, you have not told him that my cousin has a friend staying here?”
“No one has told him that, miss, unless Mr. Henry did, but he knows it well enough.”
“On no account must he be permitted to set eyes on the creature! We must—we must get rid of the pair of them!”
“Yes, miss, that’s what I have been thinking myself. But without we tell Sir Peter the whole there’s not much we can do. If it was only Mr. Henry, it would be enough for Sir Peter to tell him to be off: we could do the rest—if I may make so bold as to say so, Miss Nell! But that other! I don’t doubt Sir Peter would have him out, if he had to send for a law-officer to do the trick, but, by what Dr. Bacup says, it would bring on another stroke if he was to get agitated.”
“No, no!” Nell said, dashing a hand across her eyes.
“No, miss, that’s my own feeling. I couldn’t do it—not after all these years. We must hope that we can send Mr. Coate off without bringing Sir Peter into it.” He added thoughtfully: “Betty forgot to put a hot brick in his bed last night, but he made no complaint. It won’t do to damp the sheets, as I have told Rose, because we don’t want him laid up on our hands; but I’d say he was one as is partial to good living, and that mutton you had for dinner yesterday, Miss Nell—well! Let alone Mrs. Parbold scorching it on the spit, which she did, and the tears running down her face, Rose tells me, because we all have our pride, and no one can send up a better dressed dinner than she can!”
“Winkfield!” Nell choked, between tears and laughter. “It was shocking! I was never so mortified!”
“No, miss, I’m sure! But Sir Peter had the wing of a chicken, poached just as he likes it, and a curd pudding with wine sauce,” said Winkfield consolingly. “And Huby has been busy in the cellar all the morning, and no doubt he will warn you, miss, not to touch the burgundy at dinner. If you should be at liberty now, Sir Peter has been asking for you this hour past.”
“I will come to him directly. I must put off this old riding dress: you know how much he dislikes to see me shabbily gowned!”