"Whose idea was it that you should personate your master after his death?" resumed Conroy.
Aaron did not answer at once. His eyes had taken a dull far-away expression, as though he were lost in the past.
"Such a lot o' things had to be done that wasn't at first thought of," he presently said. "Nobody can foresee what ins and outs a matter will take when it be first planned. Hubert saw that it might not be enough to say the Squire lived over his birthday; people might clamour to see him and convince theirselves of it; and Jago, he saw it also."
"Yes. Go on."
"They thought there was nothing for it but that I must be dressed up to personate him. I fought against it; I did indeed, Miss Ella," lifting his eyes to his mistress, "but 'twas o' no manner o' use my holding out; for, as they pointed out to me, all might have been discovered unless I gave in."
"So they dressed you up!" cried Conroy.
"Hubert did it--the whole scheme was carried out by Hubert. Oh, but he was a clever lad; an amazing clever lad! Jago was deep and cunning, but he had not the talent of Hubert. Who but he got me a wig to imitate the Squire's long white hair, and a velvet skull-cap? I had to put them and the dressing-gown on every day and be drilled for an hour, till I used sometimes to half fancy that I had been transmogrified into the Squire himself. It took in Daventry's partner, and them lawyer rascals from London, finely!--and the band from Nullington and John Tilney and his wife! I had on the cat's-eye ring that the Squire had worn for thirty years."
"Dr. Jago was in the secret from the first.
"Of course he was, sir. He was just the man for a job of that sort, and it couldn't have been done without a doctor."
Mr. Conroy had been jotting down a few notes in his pocket-book.