"You like her, of course? Everybody likes Miss Deane."
"Then everybody's welcome to like her.--She's too sly for me.--But, see, I found this letter when I was sweeping just now behind her dressing-table. It must have slipped down without her knowing it. It's been opened; but as it's got master's name on it, I hardly know whether to leave it where I found it or to let master have it."
"Allow me," said Pod, authoritatively, taking the letter from the girl's hand. "You were quite right, Molly, to ask my advice." As Molly had said, the letter was plainly addressed to Mr. Kelvin, and it had evidently been opened. As two-thirds of the office correspondence was seen by Pod in one form or another, and as this particular letter was not marked "Private," he felt no compunction about opening it and reading it. It was Gerald Warburton's first letter, in which he asked whether it was true that Jacob Lloyd had died with out a will, and that he was his uncle's heir.
Pod's mind was made up in a moment. It seemed doubtful whether his master had ever seen the letter: in any case, he should see it now. "You had better leave this in my hands, Molly," he said, still with his ducal air. "It is only an ordinary business letter, which has been given to Miss Deane for some purpose, and which she has evidently mislaid. You may depend upon my making it all right, and there will be no need for you to say a word about it." Then he kissed Molly and told her not to forget the rose, and then he let her go.
"Another of your little tricks, Miss Deane, or else I'm vastly mistaken," said Mr. Piper to himself. "This letter has been cut open with a pair of scissors. The governor never cut open a letter with a pair of scissors in his life. Funny, very."
Pod's watch came to an end in about an hour. He was summoned into the room, and, much to his surprise, found his master dressed and sitting in his easy-chair. How gaunt and hollow-eyed he looked! What a wreck of his former self! How loosely his clothes hung about him! Tears came into Pod's eyes as he looked at him. All Kelvin's sternness and arbitrary ways were forgotten in pity for the plight in which he saw him now. Dr. Whitaker, with his arms folded on the table, was regarding him attentively.
"Piper," said Mr. Kelvin, "I want you to let Dr. Whitaker out, and you must contrive it so that my mother does not see him."
"Yes, sir."
"After that, you will come and help me to crawl downstairs as far as my mother's sitting-room."
"Yes, sir."