"THAT GIRL," POINTING WITH A LEAN ACCUSING FINGER AT ELEANOR, "IS NOT MY GRANDDAUGHTER MARGARET."
"My dear, is it true?" said Mrs. Murray in a bewildered tone. "I don't understand. If you are not Margaret Anstruther, who are you, and where is she?"
"That is precisely what I wish to know," broke in Mr. Anstruther sternly. "What is this girl doing here, and where is my granddaughter? Do you really mean to say," he added, "that Margaret has not been here at all? What is your name, and what are you doing masquerading here in hers?"
Though Mr. Anstruther in his anger had spoken loudly, he had not used the tone of voice suited to a deaf person, and it was pitiful to see the anxious way in which Mrs. Murray looked from one to the other, striving to hear what was said. So realising that the kindest thing she could do for her now was to tell her story quickly and not allow Mr. Anstruther to drag it from her by means of questions which Mrs. Murray could not hear, Eleanor knelt down by her chair and put her lips close to her ear.
"Shall I tell you everything from the beginning?" she said. "I can do it quickly. My name is Eleanor Carson, and on the 28th of July I was on my way from London to Seabourne to take up a position as holiday governess there, which had been offered to me for the summer holidays. I had to wait at Carden Junction for over an hour and a half, and as I was sitting in the waiting-room a girl came in. We began to talk presently, and she told me her name was Margaret Anstruther and that she was on her way to Windy Gap to stay with a Mrs. Murray, an old friend of her grandfather's, and she was to spend the summer learning Italian and having singing lessons with Madame Martelli. I envied her from the bottom of my heart, and said I wished I was in her shoes, and she said she wished she were in mine. And so in the end we decided to change. She became Eleanor Carson and went on to The Cedars, and I became Margaret Anstruther, and came here."
"The audacity, the unparalleled insolence, the unheard-of irregularity of the whole proceeding astounds me!" said Mr. Anstruther. "And where is my granddaughter now?"
"She is still with Mrs. Danvers at a house called The Cedars, Durham Road, Seabourne," said Eleanor.