"Now, Con.;" reproachfully.
"Now, auntie, don't plead, my heart is adamant. If you don't go and interview that man for the remainder of his stay I shall order William to throw him out of my dressing-room window; not that I have a rooted antipathy for him, he is certainly a clever man, and no doubt a good officer. But I am worn out, unfit for duty, and—I have another matter to attend to."
"Oh!" ejaculates Mrs. Aliston arising, "then, my child, I am ready, or almost ready, to go and inspect your new detective."
Accordingly Mrs. Aliston goes to her mirror, touches up her dressing-cap, gives a pat here, a shake there, and then ruffling her plumage like some huge old bird, follows her niece.
Across the hall they find the detective inspecting the little safe, and hurriedly introducing Mrs. Aliston, and making her own excuses, Constance hastens away and down stairs.
Down the stairs and out of the house, first because she felt oppressed and needed the soothing effects of fresh air and exercise, and, second, because she expected the tramp detective to be somewhere in the vicinity, and, for some reason, she wanted to see him. In spite of the fact that she had just declared herself bored, and desperate, and anxious to be alone; in spite of the fact that she had fled from detective number two, she wanted to see number one for a woman's reason. Having quarrelled desperately with Clifford Heath, she was immediately possessed by an insane desire to hear some one speak of him, and speak well of him. This man had treated Doctor Heath from the first with the utmost respect. He was undoubtedly pleased at their chance meeting; after all might not this secret which lay between the two be a perfectly honorable one?
In fact, Miss Wardour wanted to see Detective Bathurst, not as Detective Bathurst, but as the man who knew Doctor Clifford Heath better than she herself knew him. Of her diamonds, she never thought at all.
She felt depressed, dissatisfied, yet not quite prepared to blame herself in any way. She was possessed by more uncomfortable feelings than she could have analyzed or described, yet was too consistent a woman to be so soon ready to admit, even to herself, that she had wronged Doctor Heath. Indeed, she was more angry than ever with that unfortunate man. Had he not capped the climax of his iniquities by flying off at a tangent, and leaving her in a most uncomfortable position?
The grounds about Wardour Place were large, well shaded, and laid out with a network of walks. With a view to the avoiding of those paths overlooked by the windows of her dressing room, or other rooms where her aunt and the detective were likely to be, Constance kept to the north and east walks, thus coming near the river, which ran north and south, and toward which the eastern, or near, portion of the grounds sloped down.
Walking thus, and gazing riverward, Constance saw a form approaching, which she soon recognized as that of the detective tramp.