Fordyce rode well, and looked his best on horseback, but Cecilia having gone into the garden, the only eye which witnessed his approach to Morphie next day was that of a housemaid, for Lady Eliza sat writing in the long room.
She received him immediately.
‘I am interrupting your ladyship,’ he remarked apologetically.
‘Not at all, sir, not at all,’ said she, pushing her chair back from the table with a gesture which had in it something masculine; ‘you are always welcome, as you know very well.’
‘That is a pleasant hearing,’ replied he, ‘but to-day it is doubly so. I have come on business of a—I may say—peculiar nature. Lady Eliza, I trust you are my friend?’
‘I shall be happy to serve you in any way I can, Mr. Fordyce.’
‘Then I may count on your good offices? My uncle is so old a friend of your ladyship’s that I am encouraged to——’
‘You are not in any difficulty with him, I hope,’ said Lady Eliza, interrupting him rather shortly.
‘Far from it; indeed, I have his expressed good wishes for the success of my errand.’
‘Well, sir?’ she said, setting her face and folding her beautiful hands together. She was beginning to see light.