He knew that she was staying with the Ashfords, and he had heard the Robinson girls talking about her one day after luncheon.
"That pretty little Devonshire girl finds it dull, I think," said Violet.
"Who wouldn't?" her sister exclaimed. "She has had time to hear all old Ashford's stories a dozen times before this, and they are stupid enough the first time. But how do you know she finds it dull?"
"They say she is always running about the fields looking for primroses and cowslips. I saw her when I was out riding this morning, leaning on the gate into Nutfield Lane, with her hands full of them."
"How very picturesque! Looking into the lane for some more?"
"Or for some one to help her carry what she'd got. I don't know what I mightn't be driven to, myself, if I had to listen to old Ashford's prosing, and then go crawling out for a couple of hours boxed up in Mother Ashford's stuffy old brougham, two or three times a week. And Willy Ashford hardly ever comes, now he's engaged to that girl in Kensington."
"No," said Muriel, "and I don't know that he would mend matters much if he did. Well, perhaps somebody with a taste for cowslips and innocence, will happen to walk along Nutfield Lane next time Miss Strange is looking over the gate. What did you think of doing this afternoon?"
They were standing in the window, and speaking low. But their voices were metallic and penetrating, and the tutor, who was watching Guy's progress through a meal, which had worn out his sisters' patience, heard every word. He had his back to the light, and the boy did not see the black full veins on his forehead.
"But I want some more tart," said Guy.