So Ben had to come back at the call. To the pater’s surprise he saw his eyes were moist.
“He is worse, sir, to-day; palpably worse.”
“Will he get over it?”
Ben gave his head an emphatic shake, which somehow belied his words: “Cole and Darbyshire think there is hope yet, Squire.”
“And you do not; that’s evident. Well, good-day.”
The next move in this veritable drama was the appearance of Alice Tanerton and her six-months-old baby at Timberdale. Looking upon the Rectory as almost her home—it had been Jack’s for many years of his life—Alice came to it without the ceremony of invitation: the object of her coming now being to strive to induce Herbert to let her husband engage himself to Robert Ashton. And this visit of Alice’s was destined to bring about a most extraordinary event.
One Wednesday evening when Jack and his wife were dining with us—and that troublesome baby, which Alice could not, as it seemed, stir abroad without, was in the nursery squealing—Alice chanced to say that she had to go to Islip the following day, her mother having charged her to see John Paul the lawyer, concerning a little property that she, Aunt Dean, held in Crabb. It would be a tremendously long walk for Alice from Timberdale, especially as she was not looking strong, and Mrs. Todhetley proposed that I should drive her over in the pony-carriage: which Alice jumped at.
Accordingly, the next morning, which was warm and bright, I took the pony-carriage to the Rectory, picked up Alice, and then drove back towards Islip. As we passed Oxlip Grange, which lay in our way, Sir Dace Fontaine was outside in the road, slowly pacing the side-path. I thought I had never seen a man look so ill: so down and gloomy. He raised his eyes, as we came up, to give me a nod. I was nodding back again, when Alice screamed out and startled me. She started the pony too, which sprang on at a tangent.
“Johnny! Johnny Ludlow!” she gasped, her face whiter than death and her lips trembling like an aspen leaf, “did you see that man? Did you see him?”
“Yes. I was nodding to him. What is the matter?”