Varbarriere's mind was not upon letters that morning, but on matters nearer home.
"General Lennox has not been down-stairs yet?"
"Where's my watch? there--yes--eight o'clock. H'm. When does Lady Jane's maid go to her?"
"Not until the General has advanced himself pretty well in his toilet, the entrance being through his dressing-room."
"Yes, Monsieur, half-past eight I remember."
"And Lady Jane is called, I suppose, a little before that hour?"
"Yes, about a quarter past eight, Monsieur. Will Monsieur please to desire his cup of coffee?"
"Yes, everything--quickly--I wish to dress; and what's this? a letter."
It was from Guy Deverell, as Varbarriere saw at a glance, and not through the post.
"My nephew hasn't come?" sternly demanded Varbarriere, with a kind of start, on reading the signature, which he did before reading the letter.
"No, Monsieur, a young man has conveyed it from Slowton."
Whereupon Varbarriere, with a striped silk nightcap of many colours pending over his corrugated forehead, read the letter through the divided bed-curtains.
His nephew, it appeared, had arrested his course at Birmingham, and turned about, and reached Slowton again about the hour at which M. Varbarriere had met old Lennox in the grounds of Marlowe.
"What a fanfaronnade! These young fellows--what asses they are!" sneered Varbarriere.
It was not, in truth, very wise. This handsome youth announced his intention to visit Marlowe that day, to see Monsieur Varbarriere for, perhaps, the last time before setting forth for Algeria, where he knew a place would at once be found for him in the ranks of those brave soldiers whom France had sent there. His gratitude to his uncle years could never abate, but it was time he should cease to task his generosity, and he was quite resolved henceforward to fight his way single-handed in the world, as so many other young fellows did. Before taking his departure he thought he should present himself to say his adieux to M. Varbarriere--even to his host, Sir Jekyl Marlowe; and there was a good deal more of such stuff.
"Sir Jekyl! stuff! His uncle! lanterns! He wants to see that pretty Miss Beatrix once more! _voila tout!_ He has chosen his time well. Who knows what confusion may be here to day? No matter."