“Where is it that George has gone?” he asked. “With St. Aubyn? or to London?”
“Not to London,” replied Maria. “He has gone with Captain St. Aubyn. What made you think of London?”
“Isaac said Mrs. Pain thought he had gone to London,” replied Thomas. “It was some mistake, I suppose. But I wonder he should go out to-day for anything less urgent than necessity. The Bank wants him.”
Maria was soon to be convinced that she need not have spoken so surely about George’s having gone with Captain St. Aubyn. When she and Meta, with Margery—who would have thought herself grievously wronged had she not been one of the party to Ashlydyat—were starting, Thomas came out of the Bank parlour and accompanied them to the door. While standing there, the porter of the Bell Inn happened to pass, and Maria stopped him to inquire whether Captain St. Aubyn was better when he left.
“He was not at all well, ma’am,” was the man’s answer: “hardly fit to travel. He had been in a sort of fever all the night.”
“And my master, I suppose, must take and sit up with him!” put in Margery, without ceremony, in a resentful tone.
“No, he didn’t,” said the man, looking at Margery, as if he did not understand her. “It was my turn to be up last night, and I was in and out of his room four or five times: but nobody stayed with him.”
“But Mr. George Godolphin went with Captain St. Aubyn this morning?” said Thomas Godolphin to the man.
“Went where, sir?”
“Started with him. On his journey.”