“Please don’t,” she repeated. “It would make such a to-do. I should be so dreadfully annoyed—oh, please don’t.”
“That horrible footman” was the great terror in her mind; “if he came up and saw me he would be sure to tell his master. What would Mr Cheviott think of me if he heard of my being here, prying about his house the very day after?”
“Very well. I’m very comfortable. I’m quite content to wait till some one comes to let us out,” said Mr Morpeth. “It was you, Miss Western, that was in such a hurry.”
Which was true enough. Mary did not know what to say—only her uneasiness increased. It began to grow dusk too—outside among the trees it was getting to look decidedly dusk.
“What shall we do?” she exclaimed at last, in a sort of desperation. “Evidently they are not missing us, and will not do so till they get home, and then there will be such a fuss! Oh, Mr Morpeth,” she went on, as a new idea struck her, “do you think you could possibly get out of the window?”
She said it so simply, and was evidently so much in earnest, that Mr Morpeth gave up for once his habit of looking at the ludicrous side, and set to work to discover how this last suggestion could be carried out. The window was much more easy to deal with than the doors. It opened at once, and, leaning over, Mr Morpeth descried a little ledge below it, leading to the top of the porch above the side-door into the shrubbery.
“I can easily get out,” he said, turning back to Mary, “but once I am out what do you want me to do? You don’t want any fuss, but I must tell somebody to come and get you out.”
“Oh, yes, of course—if you could find Mrs Greville and ask her to tell the housekeeper of the door’s having shut to, she would come and open it,” said Mary. “If you could just tell her in a matter-of-fact way, you know. What I don’t want is a great rush of all the servants and people about the place to see me locked up here; it would be so uncomfortable. I’ll wait here quite patiently once I know you’ve gone, for you’ll be sure to find them.”
“I’ll do my best,” said Mr Morpeth, quietly, “and of course if I should break my neck or my arms or anything, there will be the satisfaction of knowing it was in a good cause.”
Mary started forward.