and sensitiveness of genius really approaches knowledge of itself, and as a result it is usually extremely unhappy. Walderhurst was never unhappy. He was sometimes dissatisfied or annoyed, but that was as far as his emotions went.
Being pleased by the warm touch of Emily’s hand, he patted her wrist and looked agreeably marital.
“The place was built originally for a family huntsman, and the pack was kept there. That is why it is called The Kennel Farm. When the last lease fell out it remained unlet because I don’t care for an ordinary tenant. It’s the kind of house that is becoming rare, and the bumpkin farmer and his family don’t value antiquities.”
“If it were furnished as it could be furnished,” said Emily, “it would be beautiful. One can get old things in London if one can afford them. I’ve seen them when I’ve been shopping. They are not cheap, but you can get them if you really search.”
“Would you like to furnish it?” Walderhurst inquired. The consciousness that he could, if he chose, do the utmost thing of its kind in this way, at the moment assumed a certain proportion of interest to him under the stimulation of the wonder and delight which leaped into Emily’s eyes as the possibility confronted her. Having been born without imagination, his wealth had not done for him anything out of the ordinary everyday order.
“Would I like to do it? Oh, dear!” she exclaimed. “Why, in all my life I have never dreamed of being able to do such things.”
That, of course, was true, he reflected, and the fact added to his appreciation of the moment. There were, of course, many people to whom it would be impossible to contemplate the spending of a sum of money of any importance in the indulgence of a wish founded on mere taste. He had not thought of the thing particularly in detail before, and now that he realised the significance of the fact as a fact, Emily had afforded him a new sensation.
“You may do it now, if you wish,” he said. “I once went over the place with an architect, and he said the whole thing could be made comfortable and the atmosphere of the period wholly retained for about a thousand pounds. It is not really dilapidated and it is worth saving. The gables and chimneys are very fine. I will attend to that, and you can do the rest in your own way.”
“It may take a good deal of money to buy the old things,” gasped Emily. “They are not cheap in these days. People have found out that they are wanted.”
“It won’t cost twenty thousand pounds,” Walderhurst answered. “It is a farmhouse after all, and you are a practical woman. Restore it. You have my permission.”
Emily put her hands over her eyes. This was being the Marchioness of Walderhurst, and made Mortimer Street a thing still more incredible. When she dropped her hands, she laughed even a trifle hysterically.
“I couldn’t thank you,” she said. “It is as I said. I never quite believed there were people who were able to think of doing such things.”
“There are such people,” he said. “You are one of them.”
“And—and—” She put it to him with a sudden recollection of the thing her emotions had momentarily swept away. “Oh! I must not forget, because I am so pleased. When it is furnished—”
“Oh! the Osborns? Well, we will let them have it for a few months, at any rate.”
“They will be so thankful,” emotionally. “You will be doing them such a favour.”
“I am doing it for you, not for them. I like to see you pleased.”
She went to take off her hat with moisture in her eyes, being overpowered by his munificence. When she reached her room she walked about a little, because she was excited, and then sat down to think of the relief her next letter would carry to Mrs. Osborn. Suddenly she got up, and, going to her bedside, knelt down. She respectfully poured forth devout thanks to the Deity she appealed to when she aided in the intoning of the Litany on Sundays. Her conception of this Power was of the simplest conventional nature. She would have been astonished and frightened if she had been told that she regarded the Omnipotent Being as possessing many of the attributes of the Marquis of Walderhurst. This was, in fact, true without detracting from her reverence in either case.
Chapter Ten
The Osborns were breakfasting in their unpleasant sitting-room in Duke Street when Lady Walderhurst’s letter arrived. The toast was tough and smoked, and the eggs were of the variety labelled “18 a shilling” in the shops; the apartment was also redolent of kippered herring, and Captain Osborn was scowling over the landlady’s weekly bill when Hester opened the envelope stamped with a coronet. (Each time Emily wrote a note and found herself confronting the coronet on the paper, she blushed a little and felt that she must presently awake from her dream.) Mrs. Osborn herself was looking far from amiable. She was ill and nervous and irritable, and had, in fact, just been crying and wishing that she was dead, which had given rise to unpleasantness between herself and her husband, who was not in the mood to feel patient with nerves.
“Here’s one from the Marchioness,” she remarked slightingly.
“I have had none from the Marquis,” sneered Osborn. “He might have condescended a reply—the cold-blooded beggar!”
Hester was reading her letter. As she turned the first page her expression changed. As has previously been suggested, the epistolary methods of Lady Walderhurst were neither brilliant nor literary, and yet Mrs. Osborn seemed to be pleased by what she read. During the reading of a line or so she wore an expression of slowly questioning wonder, which, a little later on, settled into relief.
“I can only say I think it’s very decent of them,” she ejaculated at last; “really decent!”
Alec Osborn looked up, still scowlingly.
“I don’t see any cheque,” he observed. “That would be the most decent thing. It’s the thing we want most, with this damned woman sending in bills like this for the fourth-rate things we live on, and for her confounded tenth-rate rooms.”
“This is better than cheques. It means our having something we couldn’t hope for cheques enough to pay for. They are offering to lend us a beautiful old place to live in for the rest of our stay.”
“What!” Osborn exclaimed. “Where?”
“Near Palstrey Manor, where they are staying now.”
“Near Palstrey! How near?” He had been slouching in his chair and now sat up and leaned forward on the table. He was eager.
Hester referred to the letter again.
“She doesn’t say. It is a sort of antiquity, I gather. It’s called The Kennel Farm. Have you ever been to Palstrey?”
“Not as a guest.” He was generally somewhat sardonic when he spoke of anything connected with Walderhurst. “But once I was in the nearest county town by chance and rode over. By Jove!” starting a little, “I wonder if it can be a rum old place I passed and reined in to have a look at. I hope it is.”
“Why?”
“It’s
