Half a Hero Part 20

"I shan't guess. When I guess, I always guess wrong," said Alicia, "and that----"

"Tells tales, doesn't it? Well! it's a great man this time."

A sudden impossible idea ran through her head. Surely it couldn't be----? But nothing we think of very much seems always impossible. It might be! Her air of raillery dropped from her. She sat down, blus.h.i.+ng and breathing quickly.

"Who is it, Willie?" she gasped.

"No, you must guess," said the Governor, over his shoulder; he was engaged in lighting a cigar.

"No, no; tell me, tell me," she could not help crying.

At the sound of her voice, he turned quickly and looked curiously at her.

"Why, Al, what's the matter?" he asked uneasily.

Surely she could not care for that fellow? But girls were queer creatures. Lord Eynesford always doubted if they really knew a gentleman from one who was--well, very nearly a gentleman.

Alicia saw his puzzled look and forced a smile.

"Don't tease me. Who is it?"

"No less a man than a Minister."

"A--Willie, who is it?" she asked, and she stretched out a hand in entreaty.

"My dear girl, whatever----? Well, then, it's c.o.xon."

"Mr. c.o.xon! Oh!" and a sigh followed, the hand fell to her side, the flush vanished.

She felt a great relief; the strain was over; there was nothing to be faced now, and, as happens at first, peace seemed almost so sweet as to drown the taste of disappointment. Yet she could not have denied that the taste of disappointment was there.

"Oh! how absurd!"

"It's rather amusing," said his Excellency, much relieved in his turn.

"You won't chaff Mary--promise."

"What about? No, I promise."

"She thought he was sweet on Eleanor, and rather backed him up--asked him here and all that, you know--and it was you all the time."

Alicia laughed.

"I thought Mary used to leave him a lot to Eleanor."

"That's it."

"But Eleanor always pa.s.sed him on to me."

"The deuce she did!" laughed Lord Eynesford.

"Don't tell Mary that!"

"Not I! Well, what shall I say? He wants to see you."

"How tiresome!"

"Look here, Al, Mary seems to have given him a bit of her mind; but I must be civil. We can't tell the chap that he's--well, you know. It wouldn't do out here. You don't mind seeing him, do you?"

Alicia said that she would do her duty.

"And shall I be safe in writing and telling him I can say nothing till he has discovered your inclinations?"

"You'll be perfectly safe," said Alicia with decision.

The Governor wrote his letter; it was a very civil letter indeed, and Lord Eynesford felt that it ought in some degree to a.s.suage the wrath which his wife's unseemly surprise had probably raised in c.o.xon's breast.

"It's all very well," he pondered, "for a man to be civil all round as I am; but his womankind can always give him away."

He closed his note, pushed the writing-pad from him, and, leaning back in his chair, puffed at his cigar. In the moment of reflection, the impression of Alicia's unexplained agitation revived in his memory.

"I don't believe," he mused, "that she expected me to say c.o.xon. I wonder if there's some one else; it looked like it. But who the deuce could it be here? It can't be Heseltine or Flemyng--they're not her sort--and there's no one else. Ah! the mail came in this morning, perhaps it's some one at home. That must be it. I like that fellow's impudence. Wonder who the other chap is. Perhaps I was wrong--you can't tell with women, they always manage to get excited about something. I swear there was nothing before I came out, and there's no one here, and----"

"Mr. Kilshaw," announced Jackson.

CHAPTER XIII.

OUT OF HARM'S WAY.

"I don't see what business it is of his," said d.i.c.k to his brother the next afternoon. "I call it infernal impertinence."

Lord Eynesford differed.

"Well, I don't," he said. "He did it with great tact, and I'm very much obliged to him."

"I wish people would leave my affairs alone," d.i.c.k grumbled.

"Has it gone very far?" asked his brother, ignoring the grumble.

"Depends upon what you call far. There's nothing settled, if that's what you mean."

"I don't know that I've any exact right to interfere, but isn't it about time you made up your mind whether you want it to go any farther?"

"What's the hurry?"