"I went upstairs as quick as I could, and the door of the study being
wide open, I could see inside. Sir Horace and the young lady had
evidently been having a quarrel. They were standing up facing each other,
and the table at which they had been sitting was knocked over, and the
refreshments I had taken up had been scattered all about. The young woman
had been crying--I could see that at a glance--but Sir Horace looked
dignified and the perfect gentleman--like he always was. He turned to me
when he saw me, and said, 'Hill, kindly show this young lady out,' I
bowed and waited for her to follow me, which she did, after giving Sir
Horace an angry look. I let her out the same way as I let her in, and
took her through the plantation to the front gate, which I locked after
her. When I got inside the house again, and was beginning to bolt up
things for the night Sir Horace called me again and I went upstairs.
'Hill,' he said, in the same calm and collected voice, 'if that young
lady calls again you're to deny her admittance. That is all, Hill,' And
he turned back into his room again.
"I didn't see her again until the morning after Sir Horace left for
Scotland. I had arranged for the female servants to go to Sir Horace's
estate in the country during his absence, as he instructed before his
departure, and they and I were very busy on this morning getting the
house in order to be closed up--putting covers on the furniture and
locking up the valuables.
"It was Sir Horace's custom to have this done when he was away every
year instead of keeping the servants idling about the house on board
wages, and the house was then left in my charge, as I told you, sir, and
after the servants went to the country it was my custom to live at home
till Sir Horace returned, coming over two or three times a week to look
over the place and make sure that everything was all right. On this
morning, sir, after superintending the servants clearing up things, I
went outside the house to have a final look round, and to see that the
locks of the front and back gates were in good working order. I was going
to the back first, sir, but happening to glance about me as I walked
round the house, I saw the young woman that Sir Horace had ordered me to
show out of the house the night before he went to Scotland, peering out
from behind one of the fir trees of the plantation in front of the house.
As soon as she saw that I saw her she beckoned to me.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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