"You will maybe be Mr. James McIntyre?" she asked, lifting her sea-blue eyes set in her apple-red face, and fixing her firm little lips in dignity. Candace was a servant and knew her place, but she felt the importance of her mission, and meant to have no disrespect done to it.
"I am Mr. George McIntyre," the gentleman replied, and, indicating the man at the door, "Mr. James McIntyre will be at liberty in a moment, but perhaps I will do as well?"
Candace cocked a glance toward the elderly back at the door; and then returned her look to Mr. George:
"You'll maybe be knowing Mr. Charles Stanhope?" she propounded, as if she were giving him a riddle, and her blue eyes looked him through and through:
"Oh, surely, surely! He was a very close friend! You—knew him?"
"I was Miss Betty's nurse who cooked the griddle cakes for you the morning after the funeral——" she said, and waited with breathless dignity to see how he would take it.
"Oh! Is that so!" He beamed on her kindly. "Yes, yes, I remember those cakes. They were delicious! And what can I do for you? Just sit down. Why, bless me, I don't know but that your coming may be very opportune! Can you tell me anything of Miss Betty?"
Candace pressed her lips together with a knowing smile as much as to say she might tell volumes if it were wise, and she cast a glance at the other brother who was shaking hands now with his visitor and promising to meet him a little later:
"Yon man'll be knowing a bit, too, I'll be thinking," she hazarded nodding toward Reyburn as he left. "He was at the wedding, I'm most sure——!"
The elder McIntyre gave her a quick glance and signalled to his brother to come near: