“Was she—um——”
“She was,” replied General Grampound to this somewhat cryptic enquiry. “Seemed regularly upset. I’m not half blind, Boxall, like some people; I can see through a brick wall as far as most, and I don’t want to be personal—I don’t want to be premature—I don’t want to pretend to know more than I ought to know, but there’s a deuced lucky dog in this room at present, and he’s not me, Boxall.”
“Thanks,” said the lucky dog, shifting about restlessly in bed. “I know you’re a good friend, Grampound. Send that message off at once, like a good fellow. How long does it take a parcel to reach this place from London by post?”
“Parcel post or letter post?”
“Letter post.”
“Oh, a day or two.”
“Send the message off at once.”
“I will.”
Meanwhile Mr Fanshawe had been writing three important letters in the library. When he had finished and carefully sealed them, he placed them one on top of the other, and looked at his watch.
Dicky had almost forgotten the burglar he was going to trap that night. The other business consumed most of his superfluous energy and thoughts. The readiness with which Violet Lestrange had fallen in with his views might have given a cold-blooded man of the world pause, for, once a girl begins smashing conventions, who knows where she will stop? But Mr Fanshawe, wise in his love, felt no uneasiness on this score; the thing that worried him was the fifteen Irish miles between Glen Druid and Tullagh station.