“To put him on a wrong scent!” Kitty exclaimed almost gleefully. “How clever you are!”
“Now let’s go up and give my brother the message. Our things can lie here till we come down again. In you go!”
They soared to the fourth floor, where the conductress rang at the door on the right. A discreet-looking man-servant opened, and permitted himself to smile a welcome.
“Good morning, Sharp,” said Hilda. “We’re not coming in. I want to see Mr. Risk for twenty seconds. As it’s so early, he may come in his dressing-gown. Tell him it’s most urgent.”
Possibly Sharp was used to Miss Risk’s ways, for he went without hesitation, and before long his master, garbed as Hilda had suggested, came forward. He was tall, thin, clean-shaven, and you would have known him as Hilda’s brother by his eyes.
“Good Lord!” he exclaimed at the sight of Kitty. “I beg your pardon!” he added quickly. “What is it, Hilda?”
“Just this, John. If a gentleman, more or less, should call here with inquiries about a Miss Kitty Carstairs, you will oblige by treating him as you would treat an undesirable person inquiring for your own sister. And please instruct Sharp accordingly.”
“Very well,” said Mr. Risk, without the slightest emotion of any kind. “I’ll remember, and so shall Sharp. But may I know the gentleman’s name, more or less?”
Hilda turned to Kitty. “Would you mind?”
“Mr. Symington,” murmured Kitty, with a lovely, shameful colour.