"Mrs. Roberts," said Ellerton, "we're investigating an unusual noise up here. Can you account for it?"
Now, Mrs. Roberts never could abide the insinuation that anything might possibly be going on of which she was ignorant; if she had nosed anything herself, she did not, as we have seen, lack zeal in ferreting it out, but it was impossible to put her on a new scent; she refused to acknowledge any other sagacity than her own. So, on the present occasion, as she had heard no noise, she utterly scouted the idea, and assigned some trifling cause for it; the girls, she said, had been in the attic, clearing out an old store-room; probably that was what Mr. Rutledge had heard. Ellerton hurried down to inform the ladies of the explanation, and Mr. Rutledge, crossing the hall, was going toward his dressing-room, when Tigre, who had been exploring the neighborhood, now rushed whining along the hall, with his nose to the floor. The attention of all was attracted to him; he darted under the wardrobe, and began scratching and growling earnestly at the door of Victor's hiding-place. I followed Mr. Rutledge's quick glance from my face to the wardrobe, and, starting forward, I tried to call off Tigre.
"Come here, sir! Come here, I say!" But he was too intent upon his discovery to heed me.
"He is a little nuisance," said Mrs. Roberts. "I never approved having him allowed to come upstairs."
"Tigre, what are you after, sir?" said Mr. Rutledge, as he walked down the hall toward him.
"Oh, nothing, I'm sure, sir, nothing!" I cried, following him. "Don't scold him. Tigre, come out, you rascal! come out, I say!" and I stamped vehemently on the floor.
"He will not mind you," said Mr. Rutledge, in a low voice. "He will obey his instincts, and persevere till he has reached the object of his search."
"He isn't searching for anything," I exclaimed, dropping down on my knees and stooping till I could see under the wardrobe. "If I could only reach him. Tigre—you torment—if you don't come, I'll whip you, so! Here, here, poor fellow! Come here, my pet!"
Tigre desisted a moment from his whining, and wavered in his determination. I thrust my arm under the wardrobe, seized him, and drew him, yelping, out; then, springing up, ran across the hall, and almost threw him into my room. Mr. Rutledge watched me silently with a contracted brow, and crossing over to his own room, shut himself into it.
Not a very faithful index, certainly of the real feelings of men and women, is to be obtained from their outward and visible emotions. A very gay party, no doubt, the visitors who came that night to Rutledge, thought they found there. They little guessed how unhappy and disappointed a man their courteous host was, nor that Mrs. Churchill, serene and charming, was looking in the face the failure of the hopes of years, nor that the pretty Josephine's smiles were in ghastly contrast with the bitterness of her spirit; nor that Phil, who knew her face too well to be deceived by them, was smarting under the realizing sense it gave him of her ambition and worldliness. And if they had guessed the interpretation of my gaiety!