"I am afraid I have paid my visit at rather at unfortunate moment," said Roderick, coming forward and addressing himself solely to Mrs. Winstanley; "but I could not go without saying How do you do? I hope you had a pleasant journey from Scotland—bar the fly."
"How do you do, Roderick? Yes; it was all pleasant except that last contretemps. Imagine the Duchess of Dovedale's feelings if she arrived at the station adjoining her own estate, and found no carriage to meet her!"
"My aunt would tuck up her petticoats and trudge home," answered Roderick, smiling. "She's a plucky little woman."
"Yes, perhaps on an ordinary occasion. But to-day it was so different. Everybody will talk about our return."
"Most people are still away," suggested Rorie, with a view to comfort.
"Oh, but their servants will hear it, and they will tell their masters and mistresses. All gossip begins that way. Besides, Colonel Carteret saw us, and what he knows everybody knows."
After this, Roderick felt that all attempts at consolation were hopeless. He would have liked to put Mrs. Winstanley into a better temper, for Violet's sake. It was not a pleasant home atmosphere in which he was obliged to leave his old playfellow on this the first day of her new life. Captain Winstanley maintained a forbidding silence; Mrs. Winstanley did not even ask anyone to have a cup of tea; Violet sat on the opposite side of the hearth, pale and quiet, with Argus at her knee, and one arm wound caressingly round his honest head.
"I've been inspecting the kennels this morning," said Roderick, looking at the new master of the Abbey House with a cheerful assumption that everything was going on pleasantly. "We shall begin business on the first. You'll hunt, of course?"
"Well, yes; I suppose I shall give myself a day occasionally."
"I shall not have a happy moment while you are out," said Mrs. Winstanley. "I used to be miserable about poor dear Edward."