The girl stared at him resentfully.
“Of course, I am awfully sorry, Martin,” she said, coldly.
“Oh, my lady,” said the woman eagerly, “I am only too pleased that you have recovered your chain. The worry of it has made me quite ill.”
“You can have a week’s holiday,” said Lord Flanborough, magnificently. “I will get you a free railway ticket to Seahampton,” he added.
“So you see, Mrs. Martin,” said Michael with that bland air of his which scarcely veiled the sarcasm so irritating to his lordship, “your generous employers will leave no stone unturned to minister to your comfort, regardless of expense. And when you are at Seahampton, Mrs. Martin, (I trust you will not lose the return half of your free ticket) you will be allowed to walk up and down the promenade on equal terms with the aristocracy and breathe the ozone which, ordinarily, is created for your betters. You may sit on the free seats and watch the pageant of life step past you and, reflecting upon the generosity of your betters, you may appreciate the good fortune which brought you into hourly contact with the aristocracy of England. And on Sundays, Mrs. Martin, you may go to church where quite a number of the seats are also free and may even share a hymnbook with a Gracious Person who is so vastly above you in social standing that he will never recognize you again, and there, I trust, you will pray with a new fervence that the deliberations of the House of Lords may receive divine inspiration.”
“Oh, indeed I will, sir,” said Mrs. Martin almost stunned by his eloquence.
He left the woman, overwhelmed, and returned with a very ruffled Lord Flanborough and an indignant Moya to the library.
“What utter nonsense you talk, Michael,” said the girl angrily. “I don’t think it was kind of you to attempt to set my servants against me.”
“Beastly bad taste,” said Lord Flanborough, “and really, Pretherston, you came here as an officer of the law and not as an old acquaintance and I think that you exceed your duties, if you don’t mind my saying so.”
“Old acquaintances,” said Michael, picking up his hat and his coat from a chair where he had put them before the interview, “are especially made to be forgotten, a peculiarity of which one is reminded in that Bacchanalian anthem which is sung at all public dinners where sobriety is bad form. I was merely endeavouring to inculcate into the mind of your slave a few moral principles, beneficial to you, and to society.”
“Don’t tell me that,” growled Lord Flanborough, “as though I didn’t recognize your sarcasm.”
“Children and the lower orders never recognize sarcasm,” said Michael with a broad smile.
He held out his hand and somewhat reluctantly his lordship extended his own flabby paw.
“Before I go,” he said, “I suppose I had better take a full account of this case. You haven’t a secretary or anybody to whom you can dictate the circumstances? You see I have to make a report to my cold-blooded superiors.”
Moya had reached the stage where whatever remains there was in her friendship with Michael Pretherston had not only died but had been cremated in the fires of her smothered anger and she was as anxious to see the end of this interview as was her father.
“Perhaps you will ring for Miss Tenby,” she said after a pause.
Her father pressed the bell and the waiting Sibble answered it.
“Send Miss Tenby,” said his lordship.
“And I do hope, Michael,” said the girl severely, “that when Miss Tenby is here you will not make such extravagant comments as you did before Martin.”
“Miss Tenby,” interposed Lord Flanborough, “will not welcome such talk. She is a young girl with—er—”
“I know, I know,” said Michael solemnly, “she is genteel. She does forty words a minute on the typewriter and goes to church, filling in her odd moments with needlework and accompanying you on the piano.”
“It must be a wonderful thing to be a detective,” said Moya, sarcastically; “as a matter of fact Miss Tenby is one of the fastest typists in the world.”
Michael swung round on her with an odd look on his face.
“Fastest typists in the world,” he repeated with all the humor gone out of his tone; “does she sing?”
It was the girl’s turn to be astonished.
“Yes, she does, and very beautifully.”
“Does she prefer Italian opera?” he asked.
At this, the girl laughed aloud.
“Somebody has been telling you all about her and you are trying to be mysterious,” she accused.
Further conversation was cut short by the arrival of the girl, who walked in, closed the door and came straight to the desk. She stopped dead at sight of Michael. Moya saw the meeting, saw the girl stiffen and her sorrowful eyes fixed upon the detective’s face.
“Why, Kate!” said Michael Pretherston softly. “Well, well, well! and to think that we meet again under such noble auspices.”
Miss Tenby said nothing.
“And what is the great game?” asked Michael, banteringly. “What beautiful impulse brought you to this sheltered home and how is the Colonel and friend Gregori and all those dear boys? By-the-way, the Colonel must be out by now, Kate. What did he get, three years?”
Still Miss Tenby made no reply.
“What is the meaning of this?” demanded Lord Flanborough, feeling that the moment had arrived to assert himself. “Do you know this lady?”
“Do I know her,” said Michael, ecstatically; “why, I am one of her greatest admirers, aren’t I, Kate?”
The girl’s sad face softened to a smile which showed the regular lines of her white teeth. She spoke and her voice was gentle and appealing.
“It is perfectly true, Lord Flanborough,” she said quietly, “Mr. Pretherston knows me. He also knows that my uncle, Colonel Westhanger, has been mixed up in a very serious scandal which brought him within
