"Well, well, sir, to your work!" he replied irritably. "Better late than never; and after all it may be preferable for you to be here and see it duly executed. Only you will not forget," he continued hastily, with a glance at the papers, "that I have myself copied four-well, three--three full folios, sir, for which an allowance must be made. But there! Get on with your work. The handwriting will speak for itself."
I obeyed, and wrote on steadily, while the earl walked up and down the room, or stood at a window. Upstairs sat Mrs. Wigram, schooling herself, I dare swear, to take this one favor that was no favor from the man who had dealt out to her such hard measure. Outside a casual passer through the square glanced up at the great house, and seeing the bent head of the secretary and the figure of his companion moving to and fro, saw, as he thought, nothing unusual; nor had any presentiment--how should he?--of the strange scene which the room with the dingy windows was about to witness.
I had been writing for perhaps five minutes when Lord Wetherby stopped in his passage behind me and looked over my shoulder. With a jerk his eye-glasses fell, touching my shoulder.
"Bless my soul!" he exclaimed, "I have seen your handwriting somewhere; and lately too. Where could it have been?"
"Probably among the family papers, my lord," I answered. "I have several times been engaged in the family business in the time of the late Lord Wetherby."
"Indeed." There was both curiosity and suspicion in his utterance of the word. "You knew him?"
"Yes, my lord. I have written for him in this very room, and he has walked up and down, and dictated to me, as you might be doing now," I explained.
His lordship stopped his pacing to and fro, and retreated to the window on the instant. But I could see that he was interested, and I was not surprised when he continued with transparent carelessness. "A strange coincidence. And may I ask what it was upon which you were engaged?"
"At that time?" I answered, looking him full in the face. "It was a will, my lord."
He started and frowned, and abruptly resumed his walk up and down. But I saw that he had a better conscience than I had given him the credit of possessing. My shot had not struck fairly where I had looked to place it; and finding this was so, I turned the thing over afresh, while I pursued my copying. When I had finished, I asked him--I think he was busy at the time cursing the absence of tact in the lower orders--if he would go through the instrument; and he took my seat.