Then Nettie yielded to impulse, and made a venture “There was nothing more,” she said reflectively. “If I had thrown myself and my money at his feet he wouldn’t have had me. I think, though he never told me, there was somebody in England he would always remember.”
The big gray eyes were perfectly steady, but a faint trace of color showed in Violet’s cheek.
“Well,” she said slowly, “Tony is going out to find him.”
Nettie felt a little thrill at what she had noticed, but she rose and, somewhat to her companion’s astonishment, kissed her.
“I’ll feel happier now I know you have forgiven me,” she said.
She had gone in another minute, and Violet Wayne lay still with half-closed eyes and a weary face, while Tony drove home up the Northrop valley with a faint hope in his heart.
It was about the same hour next day when he laid several papers down on the table at which he sat in lawyer Craythorne’s office with a little smile of content.
“It’s all straight now and I’m glad,” he said. “I can make Dane Cop over to Appleby because it never was an integral part of the estate, and it is worth a good deal to anybody now. It should, as you know, have been his in any case, while in the event of my dying unmarried he will get a share of the other property. I would have made it more only that Esmond Palliser has nearer claim.”
Craythorne folded the will just signed. “It is wise to take precautions, but one would certainly expect you to marry,” he said.
Tony rose, and smiled curiously as he straightened himself. “Well,” he said, “one can never be sure of anything—and, you see, I am going to Cuba to-morrow. Travelling there must be a trifle risky just now. Still, I fancy I shall find Appleby.”