nor Miss Drummond left a
message?" she said to the maid who brought the tea.

"Quite sure, ma'am. I had no idea they were gone."

"Do you suppose they went away together, Jane?"

Mrs. Rooke was ready to accept a crumb of possible comfort from her
handmaid.

"I do remember now, ma'am, that when I was pulling down the blind
upstairs I heard the hall-door shut twice. I never thought of looking in
the drawing-room, ma'am. I made sure that the noise of the blinds had
deceived me into taking next-door for ours."

"Ah, thank you, Jane, that will do."

The omens were not at all propitious. Mrs. Rooke was fain to acknowledge
as much to herself dejectedly. Nor did Cyprian think them propitious
when taken into counsel. When she went downstairs, she found that her
brother had come in. He was to spend the last evening at his sister's
house.

Captain Langrishe's face, however, did not invite questions. He made no
allusion at all to the happenings of the afternoon, and his sister felt
that she could not ask him. She had a heavy heart for him as she bade
him good-night, although she called something after him with a cheerful
pretence about their rendezvous next morning.

"It _is_ nine-thirty at Fenchurch Street, isn't it?" she asked.

"Do you think you will ever manage it, Bel?" Captain Langrishe smiled at
her haggardly.

"Oh, yes, easily--by staying up all night," she answered.

But her heart was as heavy as lead for him.

CHAPTER XV

THE GENERAL HAS AN IDEA

When Sir Denis came home from his club that evening he learned that Miss
Nelly had gone to bed with a headache.

Pat, who told him, looked away as he gave the information, as though he
did not believe in his own words. Miss Nelly with a headache! Why, God
bless her, she had never had such a thing, not from the day she was
born! To be sure, the whole affectionate household knew that there was
some cloud over Miss Nelly. They didn't talk much about it. Pat and
Bridget knew better than to have the servants' hall gossiping over the
master and Miss Nelly. A new under-housemaid, who was greatly addicted
to the reading of penny novelettes, suggested that Miss Nelly was being
forced into marrying her cousin by the machinations of his mother, who
was not _persona grata_ with the servants' hall. But Pat had nipped the
young person's imaginings in the bud.

"She may be contrairy enough to give the General the gout in his big toe
and the twisht in his timper, as