“Kilgobbin isn’t a farm, sor, it’s a gintleman’s estate.”
Pinckney, not at all set back by this snub, turned and looked the factotum in the face.
“Just so,” said he, “but I’ve never heard of gentlemen growing pigs to look at; peacocks, maybe, but not pigs. However, we’ll have another look at the business later.”
He turned and they went on, Rafferty disturbed in his mind and much put about by the manner of the other in whom he began to divine something more than a casual guest, Phyl almost as much put out as Rafferty.
The idea that the factotum might have been robbing her father right and left never occurred to her; even if it had, it would not have softened the fact that a strange hand was at work in her old home turning over things, inspecting them, holding them up for comment.
She managed to drop behind as they left the farm yard for the paddocks, then turning down the yew lane that led back to the house, she ran as though hounds were after her, reached the house, locked herself in her bedroom, and flung herself on the bed in a tempest of weeping, dragging a pillow over her head as if to shield herself from the blows that the world was aiming at her.
Phyl, without mother, brothers or sisters, had centred all her affection on her father and Kilgobbin; the servants, the place itself and all the things and people about it were part and parcel with her life, and the death of her father had intensified her love of the place and the people.
If Pinckney had only known, he might have put the business of the inspection of the property and the dealing with the servants into other hands, but Pinckney was young and full of energy and business ability; he was full of conscientiousness and the determination to protect his ward’s interests; he had scented a rogue in Rafferty, and at this very minute returning to the house with Hennessey, he was declaring his intention to make an overhaul of the working of the estate.
Rafferty was to appear before him and produce his accounts and make explanations. Mrs. Driscoll was to be examined as to the expenditure, etc.
He little knew the hornet’s nest into which he was about to poke his finger.