"Dear old ducky. It's just perfect to hear you! I'm only afraid of not being able to get rid of it all, but I mean to try."
"You must remember--Ehem--if you were to marry, of course your husband would help you to get rid of a good lot!"
Toney turned the conversation and the two who so well understood each other appeared in the Aldersfield drawing-room just as Lady Dove was telling Mrs. Faber to leave off as it was time to dress.
"Oh, there you are! Well, I do think, Evas, that you might have returned to tea. Has Antonia told you of the terrible inroad we have had? If----"
"Yes, yes, it was a mistake--but they didn't do any harm, did they?"
"Lewis Waycott and Edward Lang were here happily, and were very good-natured. By the way, I have had Mrs. Kenward here, and I have heard some news about him, which of course I have been expecting."
"Indeed, what's that?" said Sir Evas, pleasantly relieved that the storm was blowing over, whilst Toney leant against the door and listened.
"Lewis is going to marry his cousin Maud. It is private as yet, but quite understood."
"Good gracious! Strange we have not heard it!"
"Oh, you men have no eyes. At the party I saw them constantly smiling at each other, and Mrs. Hamilton said very pointedly something about young people fancying no one saw their inclinations. I guessed her meaning. Well, she has been working that way for some years, she means to feather her nest well, but of course it's a pity!"
Without knowing what he was doing, Sir Evas turned towards Toney, and to his surprise he found her gone.
"Well," he said, "I always thought he liked Toney! But it's no use meddling with such things."
Upstairs Toney was sitting on her window-sill with Trick in her arms. She had locked her door, and for the first time in her life there was no smile on her lips at the thought of Lewis Waycott.
"Oh, I am glad, I must be glad that he will be happy," she said to herself, "but I wish he had told me himself, though she is a nice girl and will sort of do all he wishes." Then she laid her head against Trick's face and whispered, "Trick, Trick, you'll not leave your mistress, will you, dear? You're all I've got of my very own."
After great events there is always a certain feeling of flatness, and it must have been that which made Toney somewhat silent and plunge at times into the tabulating work with furious energy. Lewis Waycott came every morning and, to everybody's surprise, the Hon. Edward often turned up too. It really was amusing to see the self-made secretaries each in front of a book and a pile of letters, whilst Plantagenet Russell indolently "bossed the show," as Toney remarked. Before he had worked long Edward Lang's labours were transmuted into conversation, and he always found an excellent excuse for luring Toney out into the park or the garden; strange to say, Toney did not seem to object, and left Lewis and Plantagenet at their task without too many apologies. The feeling of needing a good stretch came upon her, and though she would have preferred solitude, Edward Lang's thirst for information served her purpose. When Lewis was gone, however, then she returned to the tabulating work with increased energy, and the Hon. Edward's wishes could not drag her away. She said to herself she missed her chum, and that the world was a bit awry without her sweet sympathy, but she manfully fought against these feelings, flying to her "Little Flowers" for strength when she felt extra depressed. She liked reading about Brother John, of Alverina, who had entered the Order as a boy, "But seeing that God careth with tender care for His children, giving them at divers times, now consolation, and now tribulation, now prosperity, and now adversity, according as He seeth they have need thereof, for to continue in humility, or for to kindle more in them desire for heavenly things," Brother John remained without the light and love of God, and this so afflicted him that he took to running hither and thither about the woods, till at last he had a vision of Christ and after many entreaties, the gift of divine grace returned to him.