"He thinks not, but he can't say for certain--we asked him that question the next morning. He fancies that he fell asleep for a few minutes: his head was very bad. Anyway, the jewels are gone, and Aunt Gertrude can get no clue to the thief, so it is hopeless to talk of it," concluded Ella, somewhat wearily. "How is your sister?"
"Quite well, thank you. Why don't you come and see her?"
"I will; I have been very busy since I came home. And tell her, please, that I hope she will come to see me. Good-bye for the present, Captain Lennox: you are going on to my uncle; perhaps you will not be gone when I get back; I shall not be very long."
Ella tripped lightly on, Turco striding gravely beside her. Captain Lennox stood for a minute to look after her.
"I wonder," he muttered to himself, stroking his whiskers--a habit of his when he fell into a brown study--"whether it has crossed Mrs. Carlyon's mind to suspect Philip Cleeve?"
After all her vacillation, Ella went down to dinner that evening in a simple white dress. She could hardly have chosen one to suit her better; at least, so thought Mr. Conroy, when he entered the room. The dinner was not homely, as on the first occasion of his dining there; Ella had ordered it otherwise. It was served on some of the grand old family plate, not often brought to light; and the table was decorated with flowers from the Vicar's charming garden.
But what surprised Aaron more than anything else was to see his master dressed, and wearing a white cravat. He went about the house muttering, sotto voce, that there were no fools like old fools, and if these sort of extravagant doings were about to set in at the Hall--soups and fish and foreign kickshaws--it was time old-fashioned attendants went out of it. The Squire, in fact, had so thoroughly inoculated the old man with his own miserly ways, that for Aaron to see an extra shilling spent on what he considered unnecessary waste, was to set him grumbling for a day.
Whether it was that Ella had a secret dread of passing another evening alone with Conroy, or whether her intention was to render the evening more attractive to him, she had, in any case, asked her uncle to allow her to invite the Vicar and Maria, Lady Cleeve and Philip, and Captain Lennox and his sister, to meet Mr. Conroy at dinner. But here the Squire proved obstinate. Not one of the people named would he invite, or indeed anyone else.
"That young artist fellow is welcome to come and take pot-luck with us," he said, "but I'll have none of the rest. And why I asked him, I'm sure I don't know. There was something about him, I suppose, that took my fancy; though what right an invalid man like me has to have fancies, is more that I can tell."
Conroy seemed quite content to find himself the solitary guest. Ella was more reserved and silent than he had hitherto seen her, but he strove to interest her and melt her reserve; and after a time he succeeded in doing so. Once or twice, at first, when she caught herself talking to him with animation, or even questioning him with regard to this or the other, she suddenly subsided into silence, blushing inwardly as she recognised how futile her resolves and intentions had proved themselves to be. Conroy seemed not to notice these abrupt changes, and in a little while Ella would again become interested, again her eyes would sparkle, and eager questions tremble on her lips. Then all at once an inward sting would prick her, her lips would harden into marble firmness and silence. But these alternations of mood could not last for ever, and by-and-by the charm and fascination of the situation proved too much for her. "After this evening I shall probably never see him again," she pleaded to herself, as if arguing with some inward monitor. "What harm can there be if I enjoy these few brief hours?"