Robert sighed a long sigh. Was all his work undone? It wrung his heart to remember the opening of the Institute, the ardour of his boys. He asked a few questions about individuals, but soon gave it up as hopeless. The squire neither knew nor cared.
'And Mrs. Darcy?'
'My sister had tea in her thirtieth summer-house last Sunday,' remarked the squire grimly. 'She wished me to communicate the fact to you and Mrs. Elsmere. Also, that the worst novel of the century will be out in a fortnight, and she trusts to you to see it well reviewed in all the leading journals.'
Robert laughed, but it was not very easy to laugh. There was a sort of ghastly undercurrent in the squire's sarcasms that effectually deprived them of anything mirthful.
'And your book?'
'Is in abeyance. I shall bequeath you the manuscript in my will, to do what you like with.'
'Squire!'
'Quite true! If you had stayed, I should have finished it, I suppose. But after a certain age the toil of spinning cobwebs entirely out of his own brain becomes too much for a man.'
It was the first thing of the sort that iron mouth had ever said to him. Elsmere was painfully touched.