As she passed through the hall, she saw that he was sitting with Lady Rose by a window opening on to the terrace.  She was passing on, being anxious not to interrupt them, but Rose held out her hand.

“I’ve hardly seen you this morning.  Do come and sit with us.”  And then, as Molly rather shyly sat down by her side on a low sofa, Lady Rose went on: 

“I was just telling Sir Edmund a very beautiful thing that has happened, only it is very sad for dear Lord Groombridge and for her.  They have only had the news this morning, but it is not a secret, and it is very wonderful.  You know that this place was to go to a cousin, quite a young man, and they liked him very much.  They did mind his being a Roman Catholic, but they were very good about it, and now he has written that he has actually been ordained a priest, and that he will not have the property or the Castle as he is going to be just an ordinary parish priest working amongst the poor.  It is wonderful, isn’t it?  They say the next brother is a very ordinary young man—­not like this wonderful one—­and so they are very much upset to-day, poor dears.  They knew he was studying for the priesthood, but they did not realise that the time for his Ordination had really come.”

Molly murmured shyly something that sounded sympathetic, and then, looking at Sir Edmund, ventured to say: 

“Mrs. Delaport Green would like to stay till the early train to-morrow.  But have you seen Lady Groombridge?”

“Yes; it’s all right—­or rather, it’s all wrong—­but she won’t tell Groombridge to-day, and she will be quite fairly civil, I think.”

“And this news,” said Rose gently, “will make them both think less of that unfortunate affair last night.”

Molly rose and moved off with an unusually genial smile.

CHAPTER XI

THE THIN END OF A CLUE

Edmund Grosse later on in the morning strolled down to the stables.  He had been there the day before, but he had still something to say to the stud-groom, an old friend of his, who had the highest respect for the baronet’s judgment.

Edmund loved a really well-kept stable, where hardly a straw escapes beyond the plaited edges, where the paint is renewed and washed to the highest possible pitch of cleanliness, and where a perpetual whish of water and clanking of pails testify to a constant cleaning of cobblestone yard and flagged pavement.

In the middle of Groombridge Castle stable-yard there was an oval of perfect turf, and that was surrounded by soft, red gravel; then came alternate squares of pavement and cobble-stones, on to which opened the wide doors of coach-houses and stables and harness-rooms, and the back gate of the stud-groom’s house.

An old, white-haired, ruddy-faced man standing on the red gravel smiled heartily when Sir Edmund appeared.  The man was in plain clothes, with a very upright collar and a pearl horseshoe-pin in his tie; his figure was well-built, but showed unmistakably that his knees had been fixed in their present shape by constant riding.