“Will you please get this taken to Mr. Raeburn?  And then, don’t disturb me again for half an hour.”

And for that time she lay in Miss Raeburn’s favourite chair, outwardly at rest.  Inwardly she was ranging all her arguments, marshalling all her forces.

When the chiming clock in the great hall below struck nine, she got up and put the lamp for a moment on the mantelpiece, which held a mirror.  She had already bathed her face and smoothed her hair.  But she looked at herself again with attention, drew down the thick front waves of hair a little lower on the white brow, as she liked to have them, and once more straightened the collar and cuffs which were the only relief to her plain black dress.

The house as she stepped out into it seemed very still.  Perfumed breaths of flowers and pot-pourri ascended from the hall.  The pictures along the walls as she passed were those same Caroline and early Georgian beauties that had so flashingly suggested her own future rule in this domain on the day when Aldous proposed to her.

She felt suddenly very shrinking and lonely as she went downstairs.  The ticking of a large clock somewhere—­the short, screaming note of Miss Raeburn’s parrot in one of the ground-floor rooms—­these sounds and the beating of her own heart seemed to have the vast house to themselves.

No!—­that was a door opening—­Aldous coming to fetch her.  She drew a childish breath of comfort.

He sprang up the stairs, two or three steps at a time, as he saw her coming.

“Are you rested—­were they good to you?  Oh! my precious one!—­how pale you are still!  Will you come and see my—­grandfather now?  He is quite ready.”

She let him lead her in.  Lord Maxwell was standing by his writing-table, leaning over the petition which was open before him—­one hand upon it.  At sight of her he lifted his white head.  His fine aquiline face was grave and disturbed.  But nothing could have been kinder or more courtly than his manner as he came towards her.

“Sit down in that chair.  Aldous, make her comfortable.  Poor child, how tired she looks!  I hear you wished to speak to me on this most unhappy, most miserable business.”

Marcella, who was sitting erect on the edge of the chair into which Aldous had put her, lifted her eyes with a sudden confidence.  She had always liked Lord Maxwell.

“Yes,” she said, struggling to keep down eagerness and emotion.  “Yes, I came to bring you this petition, which is to be sent up to the Home Secretary on behalf of Jim Hurd, and—­and—­to beg of you and Aldous to sign it, if in any way you can.  I know it will be difficult, but I thought I might—­I might be able to suggest something to you—­to convince you—­as I have known these people so well—­and it is very important to have your signatures.”

How crude it sounded—­how mechanical!  She felt that she had not yet command of herself.  The strange place, the stately room, the consciousness of Aldous behind her—­Aldous, who should have been on her side and was not—­all combined to intimidate her.