"Eh--what's this?--what's this?" he said, cheerfully. "Hope I'm not intruding, as what's-his-name says in the play. Rehearsing a little comedietta, or what?"
"Run away to your room now, my dear," said Lady Dudgeon, as she rose and kissed Eleanor. "Every cloud has its silver lining. Keep up your spirits, and remember that you shall never want for a home as long as Sir Thomas and I are on this side of the grave."
Eleanor did not wait for another word, but hurried out by the opposite door as Sir Thomas came forward. Then the baronet had to be told everything, and it is needless to say how great was his surprise, which he expressed in far more voluble terms than his wife had done.
"If our Nelly ain't Jacob Lloyd's daughter, whose child is she?" he said, after he had had time to calm down a little. "Kelvin found that out, I suppose, at the same time that he found out the other."
"At present he has no clue whatever to the parentage of Miss Lloyd."
"Why, it's quite a romance! I must call and see Kelvin to-morrow, and talk it over with him myself."
"To-morrow is Sunday, Sir Thomas," said her ladyship, severely. "And on Monday morning we start for town."
"Ah, so we do," said the baronet, scratching his chin with an air of perplexity.
"I have decided to place Eleanor's interests in the hands of Mr. Barclay, so that the less you interfere personally in the matter the better."
"Quite right, my dear, quite right. But what's to become of the poor girl meanwhile?"