“It is the best thing he can do, poor child. It would be a shame to disturb him. He does look a delicate little creature, to be sure. One sees it even plainer by daylight,” she said, when she came to Claudia’s room to report. “But you’re looking tired yourself, Miss Meredon, this morning. It was rather an upset for you last night. He did look deathly when they brought him in.”
“Yes; he looked dreadful,” Claudia agreed. “How is her ladyship, Mrs Ball? It was an upset for her too.”
“I’ve not seen her, miss; but she was ringing to know if the letters hadn’t come. It will be a very dull Christmas here if my lady goes up to spend it in town. We were hoping with a young lady like you here, missy, it would have been a bit livelier. There are some nice families about, where there are young people, but my lady’s got so out of the way of seeing any one, but just her own old friends.”
“I’m afraid my being here wouldn’t have made Christmas any cheerier, Mrs Ball,” said Claudia. “I don’t much mind whether we spend it here or in London. I’m glad to be a companion to Aunt Mildred, at least I’m glad that she seems to like to have me.”
“That she does, missy,” said the old housekeeper heartily.
Lady Mildred still seemed anxious and pre-occupied when Claudia met her at breakfast; but she was gentle and less irritable than was usual with her when she was at all uneasy.
“I have no letter from Mr Miller, yet. I cannot understand it,” she said; “he promised to write at once, and explain what this business is that he wants to see me about. He said it was nothing pressing—‘pressing’ is such an indefinite word. If it was nothing pressing what did he say he wanted to see me for, and ask so particularly if I was likely to be in town.”
“It is as if he wished to talk over something with you, perhaps to see you more than once, and not hurriedly,” said Claudia.
“Yes,” said Lady Mildred, “that is the feeling his letter gave me. The little boy seems better this morning Mrs Ball tells me,” she went on.
“Yes, she came to my room to tell me so,” Claudia replied; she was on the point of going on to tell her aunt about the disturbances of the night when something made her stop short. It would be scarcely fair to Gervais to do so, she reflected; at any rate while he was still in the house and might dislike being cross-questioned about the matter, as Lady Mildred would probably insist upon. Then she shrank a little from bringing up the old ghost-story just now, when her aunt was already evidently rather uneasy, for Claudia had detected a certain dislike to and avoidance of the subject on Lady Mildred’s part, even while she affected to treat it all as nonsense.