Her fancy played sweetly around the image of the artist-hero, her pulses beat a glad chime because he was living, and not dead. She waxed less shy, and chatted to her companions,—even daring to ask questions, a thing her aunts never permitted. She gave them reminiscences of her childish days, when she lived in London, and of a dream she had constantly of streets full of houses, one after another, in endless succession, with very few trees among them.
"That is all I know of London," she said, "and I hardly remember anything that happened, except hearing the baby cry in the night. It was Godfrey. I used to wake up in my little bed, and see nurse sitting with the baby near the lamp, rocking him in her arms. I remember being taken in to kiss papa when he was dead; but that was not in London—it was somewhere in the country—at Fallowmead, where Godfrey's uncle has his racing-stud. I remember mamma; she was not my real mamma. I could not bear her. She used to whip me, and once I bit her in the arm."
"My dear Elsa!" said Lady Mabel.
"I did. I was a very naughty little girl—at least, Jane always says so. I remember being shut up alone for a punishment."
As she spoke, they turned a bend in the road, and came in sight of the spot where the crime had been perpetrated.
Two men stood there talking together. One was Mr. Dickens of Scotland Yard, the other Elsa greeted with a glad wave of the hand in greeting.
"Oh," cried she, springing forward, "it's Mr. Fowler, it's my godfather! I did not know he had come back!"
At the sound of her voice, Mr. Fowler turned round, and his face lighted up as she came towards him.
"Why, Elsie!" he said, "there you are, my child! And I'm hearing such doings of yours, it makes me quite proud of you. And you, sir," he went on, addressing Claud, "are Mr. Cranmer, I suppose, and entitled to my very hearty goodwill for your behavior in this matter."
Claud had heard of Mr. Fowler before, as a local justice of the place, and he gladly shook hands with him, scrutinizing, of course, as he did so, the general mien and bearing of his new acquaintance.