"Yet," muttered Granger to himself, as he regarded the latter, "you are useless; you will never be paid. Nevertheless, I will keep you--keep you safe. You may some day become a witness, if not a principal."
After which he laughed softly to himself, and continued to do so until he was in bed.
"If I possess him, I may be unhappy, But, if I lose him, I am surely so."
Meanwhile a different scene was being enacted earlier in Cowley Street, Lambeth, or, as it was more often termed, Cowley Street, Westminster--a spot now quaint and old, but then almost fresh and new; a street to which, then as now, there would come from the river a wafted scent of new-mown hay (especially in the warm days of harvest-time, when windows were open), brought up or down the river in great cumbrous barges for sale in London; a quiet place which was then as peaceful and tranquil as the streets of old country towns are now.
All through the day which preceded that night when Beau Bufton had celebrated his last hours of bachelor freedom, as he had cynically termed the conclusion of his unwedded life, Ariadne Thorne had either sat in the great parlour on the lower floor--a floor raised some three or four feet above the level of the road and narrow footway outside--had sat glancing eagerly out of the long windows which faced the walls that enclosed the grounds of the Abbey, or, pacing the spacious room, had given herself up to uneasy thoughts.
"Will he ever come?" she whispered to herself again and again, "or, coming, ever forgive me for what I have done--am about to do? I pray God he may."
Then, almost distraught, she would seize the long bell-rope and summon Mrs. Pottle to her presence, who, entering with a look of strange, hard determination on her strong features, would stand before her mistress ready to answer, for the twentieth time, any questions that might be asked her, and ready also to dispel any doubts which might exist in the girl's perturbed mind.
"He must have received my letter," Ariadne would then say; "must have had it in his hands by yesterday morning at the latest. Must he not, Pottle?"
"In truth he must," her old nurse and attendant from the first would say; "he must indeed, deary."
"And, receiving it, would come. Surely he would come, Rebecca," addressing the woman now, as most often she did, by her Christian name.