For a moment tears filled her eyes, and the “nasty, sly little writing” swam away in mist. Then pride came to her aid. “Let them meet, let them skate, and welcome,” she said to herself. “I couldn’t make myself care if I tried. Piers is nothing to me; she is nothing to me—oh, yes, she is, though I hate her, and I’ve a great mind to sit up here all night, and when they come down—no, that wouldn’t do either, they would think I was jealous of Piers, when I don’t care twopence-halfpenny about him. But someone shall spoil her little game. I know what I’ll do!” here Nellie crept back to the drawing-room door and peeped in. Cousin Lavinia and Guy were leaving the room by another door which led by a different way to the upper quarters.
“Good night!” Cousin Lavinia was saying, “I hope you’ll enjoy your smoke; but don’t forget that it is the rule of the house that all lights should be extinguished by eleven.”
Then Nellie knew that Guy, according to his usual custom, was going to the smoking-room for half an hour before he went up to bed. Now, should she follow him there, put the scrap of paper into his hand, and tell him that he ought to look after that bold, flirting sister of his? Nellie rehearsed all she would say, all he might say, and then found that she had not courage for the task. So she decided that she would slip the quarter-sheet of paper under the door, give a rap to draw his attention to it, and then disappear before he had time to open the door. There would be no necessity to explain to him her reason for thus doing, for of course he would recognise his sister’s writing and be on the alert at once.
Guy, reclining comfortably on a lounge, enjoying at one and the same moment a delightful cigar and a Spanish newspaper, was a little startled to hear suddenly two sharp raps at the door.
“Come in,” he said, then waited a moment, and said “Come in” again, wondering who, of that remarkably quiet household, was the one likely to intrude on the gentlemen’s quarters at that—for them—late hour.
But when, after a moment or so, no one availed themselves of his invitation to enter, he got up from his lounge and went to the door and lo! the scrap of paper pushed beneath it caught his eye. For a moment all was bewilderment to him; then things began to clear themselves. “By Jove, an appointment!” he exclaimed. “I had no idea she would go so far as that. It’s a trifle forward of her to take the initiative in this way; but still, twenty thousand pounds is twenty thousand pounds, and is not to be picked up every day in the week. For of course it’s Nellie’s writing, a little, cramped, schoolgirlish hand—just what one would expect from a girl shut up as she has been all her life.”
And then he opened the door, and looked right and left to see if a glimpse of Nellie was to be had. But, instead of Nellie, his eyes were met by the sight of Beatrix, fully dressed, coming down the stairs.
“Oh, Guy, give me one of those Spanish newspapers that came today,” she exclaimed, as she approached; “since it is the rule of the house”—here she mimicked Cousin Lavinia’s tone—“not to skate the New Year in, I’m going to read it in with news of my old friends in Granada! What on earth is the matter? You look as if you had seen a ghost!”
Guy, in a most mysterious manner, beckoned his sister into the smoking-room, and when he had shut the door, spread the scrap of notepaper before her, saying: “Do you know Nellie’s writing?”
“I’m not sure that I do. Why! That’s not from her!”
“I don’t know who it’s from if not from her,” said Guy. “It was put under this door just now in a most mysterious fashion, and if you couple the fact with her wish for a little moonlight skating—”
“Really, Guy,” interrupted Beatrix, “your vanity carries you too far. It’s much more likely to be from one of the housemaids, or the cook. Nellie, indeed! I’d go and ask her at once, only I wouldn’t like to insult her so far. Put it behind the fire, and go to bed. Give me the newspaper. Thank you. Good night.”
But when Beatrix had got back to her room she did not feel half so sure as she had seemed to Guy, as to the writer of the brief note. If not written and delivered by Nellie, by whom, then, was it written and delivered? Who else was there in the house likely to make an appointment with Guy? Not Cousin Lavinia, assuredly, nor any one of the maids. In spite of her assurance, Beatrix knew that they were all too well looked after by Cousin Lavinia to be guilty of such an indiscretion. A vague feeling of uneasiness took possession of her. Then a sudden thought struck her, and her eyes grew merry once more. “Capital idea!” she said, clapping her hands together softly. “Guy at once concludes this missive comes from Nellie, because his thoughts have been full of Nellie all the week. Now I’ll just, by the way of experiment, put a similar note under the doors of my other relatives this night, and I shall watch the result with great interest. It will show me which way their proclivities incline, and at the same moment keep Nellie from committing any outrageous piece of folly by letting her find
