Lady Dudgeon strove her hardest to hide from Olive the effect which her words had upon her. "Well, well, young people will be young people till the end of the chapter," she said at last, with a ghastly attempt at cheerfulness.
"Mr. Pomeroy will now have an opportunity of proving the disinterestedness of his affection," said Olive, in her slow, incisive way. "He can now let the world see that it was not Miss Lloyd's money, but Miss Lloyd herself, that he fell in love with."
"What a strange person you are, Miss Deane!" her ladyship could not help saying.
Olive smiled coldly, and then rose to go.
[CHAPTER VIII.]
WINGED WORDS.
It was not in the nature of things that Sir Thomas Dudgeon should long keep to himself the news which had just been told him. He was bursting to tell somebody, and as Gerald was to a certain extent one of the family, it seemed only right that Gerald should know all. So into the sympathetic ear of his secretary the whole story was volubly poured, with many a comment, and many an expression of sympathy for poor unfortunate Eleanor. "I feel as if I loved her better now than ever I did before," the baronet finished up by saying. "She shall never want for a home as long as I'm master at Stammars."
"It has come at last, and I'm glad of it," said Gerald to himself, "and has thereby saved me the necessity of telling a very disagreeable story. I can't at all understand why Kelvin should have kept this knowledge to himself for so long a time. There seems to me something strangely underhand in his way of dealing with the affair. However, better late than never--better that she should hear it from him than from me. I must go and find her at once."
Fortunately, Sir Thomas did not detain him long. The old gentleman was anxious to have an hour or two with Cozzard, and to go round the farm on Grey Dapple once again. He sighed to think that it would be his last opportunity for doing so before his return to that hateful London. On Monday morning they were all to go up to town, and then farewell to the dear delights of the country for at least two months to come.
Gerald's puzzle was how to contrive an interview with Eleanor without the knowledge of Lady Dudgeon. As it happened, he was on pretty good terms with Tipper, the young person who, among her other duties, acted as maid to Miss Lloyd. Her he now contrived to capture, and putting half-a-crown into one of her hands, and a note into the other, he found no difficulty in inducing her to do his bidding. All he said in the note was--