“No. Lady Elizabeth is too ill to stand much fuss and excitement. So the wedding is to be as quiet as possible, and is to take place at Moorbye Church, the Rev. Mr. Garth officiating. It is just as well for everybody.”
“Yes, it is just as well. And now, do you know, Marvel, I feel ill with the shock of all you have told me, and—”
Marvel at once jumped up and offered to fetch a cab for me. I gladly accepted his offer, and reached home half an hour later, while Marvel returned to his master’s town house, to fulfill those duties which his long attachment to the Greatlands family, and his identification of his own honor with that of his employers, alone made it possible for him to continue.
CHAPTER X.
“’Tis better to be born lucky than rich.”
“You have been gone a long time, my dear,” said madame. “I had begun to be quite anxious about you, and some one has been waiting for you who is becoming, oh! so impatient.”
“Impatient to see me? Why, I shall believe myself to be quite an important individual soon,” I returned, with an attempt at a smile, that was so lamentable a failure that madame’s attention was aroused at once.
“What is it, my child?” she asked solicitously. “I thought, when you came in, that you were looking extra well. You had such rosy cheeks. Now I see that you are flushed with excitement. How is it? Have you had an adventure? You are trembling all over.”
“Yes, I have had an adventure,” I said, my pent-up emotions finding vent in tears, which soon relieved me a little, and were not checked by madame, who fully understood the value of this outlet for nature’s wellsprings of feeling. She was at first somewhat alarmed as to the nature of my adventure. But I speedily reassured her on that score, telling her that I had met an old family servant, who had been giving me some news that had upset me for a time.
“Is it very bad news?” she asked.