It was evident by his tone and manner that he was in one of his least genial humours. Both ladies knew from experience that the wisest plan at those times was to leave him to himself, and they resumed their own converse. Mr. Chattaway stood with his back to them, his hands in his pockets, his eyes peering into the dark night. Not in reality looking at anything, or attempting to look; he was far too deeply engaged with his thoughts to attend to outward things.
He was beginning very slightly to repent of the horsewhipping, to doubt whether it might not have been more prudent had he abstained from inflicting it. As many more of us do, when we awake to reflection after some act committed in anger. If Rupert was to be dreaded; if he, in connection with others, was hatching treason, this outrage would only make him a more bitter enemy. Better, perhaps, not to have gone to the extremity.
But it was done; it could not be undone; and to regret it were worse than useless. Mr. Chattaway began thinking of the point which had led to it—the refusal of Rupert to say who had admitted him. This at least Mr. Chattaway determined to ascertain.
"Did either of you let in Rupert last night?" he suddenly inquired, looking round.
"No, we did not," promptly replied Miss Diana, answering for Mrs. Chattaway as well as for herself, which she believed she was perfectly safe in doing. "He was not in until eleven, I hear; we went up to bed long before that."
"Then who did let him in?" exclaimed Mr. Chattaway.
"One of the servants, of course," rejoined Miss Diana.
"But they say they did not," he answered.
"Have you asked them all?"
No. Mr. Chattaway remembered that he had not asked them all, and he came to the conclusion that one of them must have been the culprit. He turned to the window again, standing sulkily as before, and vowing in his own mind that the offender, whether man or woman, should be summarily turned out of the Hold.