But respite was at hand. “Can we come in?” asked a voice at which Richard Bransby winced again.
“Yes, Hugh, come along,” Helen said cheerfully. “Dr. Latham will be glad to see you; he has finished his delicate confidences.”
“It’s all right, Stephen, we won’t be in the way,” Hugh called over his shoulder as he strolled through the doorway, a boyish, soldierly young figure, sunny-faced, frank-eyed. He wore the khaki of a second lieutenant. He went up to his uncle. Bransby’s fingers tightened at the throat of the green god, and imperiled the delicately cut pink lotus leaves.
“I suppose Helen told you that she beat us,” the young fellow said, laying a coin near Bransby’s hand. “There’s the shilling I owe you, sir—the last of an ill-spent fortune.”
“Thanks,” Bransby spoke with difficulty. But the boy noticed nothing. He already was moving to the back of the room where Helen was sitting.
“Have you told him?” Hugh said in a low voice as he sat down beside her.
Stephen Pryde threw one quick glance to where they sat as he came quickly in, but only one, and he went at once to his uncle. “I hope Grant didn’t bring you any bad news, sir?” he said.
Bransby was sharply annoyed. He answered quickly, with a swift furtive look at his nephew. “How did you know Grant was here?”
“Barker told me. I hope there is nothing wrong, sir?”
“Wrong? What could be wrong?” The impatience of Bransby’s tone brooked no further questioning.
Latham had joined Helen, and Hugh had left her then and had been strolling about the room unconcernedly. He came up to his uncle chuckling.
“Old Grant is a funny old josser,” he said. “He is like a hen with one chick around the office. Why, if one is ten minutes late in the morning, he treats it as if it was a national calamity.”
Bransby lifted his head a little and looked Hugh straight in the face. It was the first time their eyes had met—since Grant’s visit. “Grant has always had great faith in you, Hugh,” the uncle said gravely.
Hugh responded cheerfully. “He’s been jolly kind to me, too. He is a good old sport, when you get beneath all the fuss and feathers.” And he strolled back to Helen, Richard’s eyes following him sadly. Latham gave way to Hugh and wandered over to a bookcase and began examining its treasures.