"None whatever, Miss Sudlow. You have done your duty, and I honour you for it; indeed, I may add that I am infinitely obliged to you."
That he was terribly pained and distressed by what had just been told him was plainly evident. Sick at heart, Fanny left him. Just then she devoutly wished that she had never set foot across the threshold of Loudwater House.
Mention has been made of a certain Miss Annabel Glyn. Till within six months of the date at which we have now arrived the young woman in question had been a milliner's assistant in one of the Merehampton shops. Then, by the death of an uncle in Australia, she had come in for a fortune of eight thousand pounds, whereupon she had at once thrown up her situation, and, till she could decide upon her future plans, had gone to lodge with the widow of a Captain Malcolm in the most fashionable part of Merehampton. Miss Glyn being of age and both her parents being dead, she was at liberty to bestow her hand and fortune on whomsoever she pleased.
Denia's information with regard to Dyson and Miss Glyn having been seen walking out together had reached her through a very simple channel. It so fell out that Charlotte Wallis (she who had been the first to find Mr. Melray's body and give the alarm), whose duties were partly those of own maid to young Mrs. Melray, had a brother who was a member of the very limited police force of Merehampton. It was through information furnished by him to his sister and passed on by the latter to her mistress, that Denia had based the interrogatory she put to Dyson in the garden. Still, she was willing to believe that Charlotte's brother might have been mistaken, more especially after Dyson's emphatic denial that he had ever been out walking with Annabel Glyn.
[CHAPTER XX.]
"WE MUST SPEAK BY THE CARD."
It was Thursday morning, the morning of the day following that of Mr. Melray's journey to London. Denia, Freddy, and Miss Sudlow breakfasted by themselves, Mr. Melray having requested that his tea and toast might be taken upstairs to his dressing-room. Denia had just left the table and was on her way back to her own room, when she was accosted by Charlotte. "If you please, ma'am," said the girl, "I have had a note this morning from my brother. I don't know whether you would care to read it, but in case you should I have left it on your dressing-table."
Be it noted that Charlotte was the only person, or so Denia believed, who had any knowledge or suspicion of the relations between Dyson and her mistress.
Denia nodded and passed on. Shutting the door of the room behind her, she went quickly up to the table and pounced on the note. She felt quite sure that Charlotte would not have left it for her to read had there not been something in it which nearly concerned her.
Here is what she read: