In a few moments the groom rode up. Jenny was waiting for him, took the letter from him, and opened it.

"No answer," she said. "Thank you. You'll ask them to give you a gla.s.s of beer, won't you?"

The man thanked her, touched his hat, and rode off to the servants'

quarters.

"In old days the bearer of bad tidings wouldn't have got a gla.s.s of beer," I suggested.

"The tidings are doubtful." She gave me the letter: "He is terribly cut up. He promises me an answer to-morrow. I haven't told him yet that I must stick to it _anyhow_. That's for to-morrow, too, if it must come.

My love to her.--AMYAS."

"It'd be so much better if he never had to say that," Jenny reflected thoughtfully.

Certainly it would. If the thing could be managed without a rupture, without defiance on the one side or an unyielding posture on the other, it would be much more comfortable for everybody afterwards.

"Still, you know, he's ready to do it if he must." Her pride in her romantic handiwork spoke again.

Suddenly Margaret was with us, out of breath from her run downstairs, gasping out a prayer for the letter. Jenny gave it to her, and she read it. She looked up to Jenny with terrified eyes.

"He mustn't do it for me. I must give him up, Jenny," she murmured, woefully forlorn.

Very gently, just the least scornfully, Jenny answered, "We don't give things up at Breysgate." She stooped and kissed her. "Go and dream that it's all right. It will be by this time to-morrow. Austin and I have a little business to talk over."

Having thus dismissed Margaret (who carried off the precious distressful letter with her), Jenny led me back into the library, bidding me to go on smoking if I really must. She sat down, very thoughtful.

"It's delicate," she said. "Of course I'm trying to bribe him, but I don't want to seem to do it. If I make my offer before he decides, that looks like bribing. If he decides against us, and we make it then--bribery still! But in addition to bribery, there'll be the bad feeling between Amyas and him. No, we must do it before he decides! Only you'll have to be very diplomatic--very careful how you do it."

"I shall have to be?" I exclaimed fairly startled. "I----!"

"Well, I can't go to him, can I?" she asked. "That really would be too awkward!" She smiled at the thought of the suggested interview.

"Pens, ink, and paper!" I suggested, waving a hand toward the writing-table.

"No, no--I want the way felt. If you see he's going to give in without--without the bribe--of course you say nothing about it till he's consented. That'd be best of all; then there's no bribe really. But if he looks like deciding against us, then you tactfully offer the bribe.

You must be feeling his mind all the time, Austin."

"And if he has already decided against us?"

She looked at me resolutely. "Remind him that it's not as bad as it might be."

"Bribe--and bully?"

"Yes." She met my eyes for a minute, then turned her head away, with a rather peevish twist of her lips.

"This is a pleasant errand to send a respectable man on! Do you want me to go to him at the Manor?"

"Yes--the very first thing after breakfast, so as to catch him, if you can, before he has had time to p.r.o.nounce against us, if that's what he's going to do. A man surely wouldn't do a thing like that before breakfast! You'll go for me, Austin?"

"Of course I'll go for you if you want me to."

"Then I'll give you your instructions."

She gave them to me clearly, concisely, and with complete decision. I heard her in a silence broken only once--then by a low whistle from me.

She ended and lay back in her chair, her eyes asking my views.

"You're in for another big row if you do this, you know," I remarked to her.

"Another row? With whom?"

"Why, with Cartmell, to be sure! It's so much more than's necessary."

"No, it's not," she declared rather hotly. "It may be more than's necessary for her, or perhaps for Lord Fillingford. It's not more than is necessary for me--nor for Leonard."

I shrugged my shoulders. She laughed rather impatiently. "One's friends always want one to be a n.i.g.g.ard!" She leaned forward to me, breaking into a coaxing smile, "Remember 'the handsome thing,' dear Austin."

I came to her and patted her hand. "I'm with you right through. And, after all, you'll still have a roof over your head."

She looked at me with eyes merry, yet foreseeing. "I shan't be in at all a bad position." She laughed. "No harm in that--so long as it doesn't interfere with Margaret?"

"No harm in the world. I was only afraid that you'd lost sight of it."

Jenny sighed and smiled. "You needn't be afraid of such a complete transformation as that," she said.

CHAPTER XXV

A FRESH COAT OF PAINT

It was all very well to tell me that I must feel Fillingford's mind, but that possession of his had always seemed to me to achieve a high degree of intangibility. His words were not in the habit of disclosing more of it than was necessary for his purpose--without any regard for his interlocutor's--while his face reduced expression to a minimum. For all you got from looking at him, you might pretty nearly as well have talked with your eyes shut. That sudden stroke of surprise and relief at Alison's stood out in my memory as unique--the only real revelation of his feelings which I had seen reflected on his countenance. High demands were being made on me as an amateur diplomatist!

My arrival at the Manor was early--untimely probably, and certainly unexpected. The very butler showed surprise, and left me standing in the hall while he went to discover whether Fillingford could see me. Before this he had suggested that it was Lacey whom I really wanted and that, since Lacey had gone out riding directly after breakfast, my errand was vain. When I insisted that I knew whom I wanted, he gave way, still reluctantly; several minutes pa.s.sed before he returned with the message that his lordship would receive me. He led me along a corridor, toward a door at the far end of it. To my consternation, as we approached that door, Lady Sarah came out of it--and came out with a good deal of meaning. She flounced out; and she pa.s.sed me with angry eyes and her head erect. I felt quite sure that Lady Sarah had been against my being received at all that morning.

During previous visits to the Manor, I had not enjoyed the privilege of being shown Fillingford's study, in which I now found myself (not without qualms). It was a large room which mere neglect would have left beautiful; but, unlike the rest of the house, it appeared to have been methodically rendered depressing. His dour personality had--in his own sanctum--overpowered the native beauty of his house. Even the charming view of the old park was more than half hidden by blinds of an indescribably gloomy brown, which challenged to a match the melancholy of a drab carpet. Two or three good portraits were killed by their surroundings--but Fillingford himself seemed in a deadly harmony with his room. His thin gray face and whitening hair, his dull weary eyes, and his rounded shoulders, made him and his room rather suggestive of a funeral card--broad-edged in black, with a photograph of the late lamented in the middle--looking as dead as the intimation told one that unfortunately he was.

He rose for a moment to shake hands, indicating a chair for me close by the table at which he sat. The table was covered with papers and bundles, very neatly arranged; everything in the room was in its place to an inch.

"I'm glad to see you, Mr. Austin," he said in reply to my apology for so early a visit, "and if you come on business, as you say, the hour isn't at all too early for me." He was perfectly courteous--but dry as dust.

"I come on Miss Driver's behalf. As you are probably aware, your son Lord Lacey has done Miss Margaret Octon the honor of making her a proposal of marriage. Miss Octon is in the position of being under Miss Driver's care--I may perhaps call her her ward--and Miss Driver is anxious to know whether Lord Lacey's proposal has your approval."

"Has it Miss Driver's approval?" he asked.

"Most cordially--provided it has yours. Further than that she wouldn't wish to go without knowing your views."

He spoke slowly and deliberately. "You and I have approached this subject before--incidentally, Mr. Austin. I have little doubt that you gathered from that conversation that I had had another idea in my mind?"