‘I don’t see that it can interest you.’

‘No, I don’t see that it can.  Still, you may as well explain.’

Jessie sipped her wine.

‘It’s only that they say she’s engaged.’

‘To whom?’

‘A gentleman in London—­somebody in the family where she was teaching.’

‘How do you know that?’ he asked, with the same blending of indifference and annoyed persistency.

’Why, it’s only a guess, after all.  One day Barbara and I went to see her, and just as we got to the door, out comes a gentleman we’d never seen before.  Of course, we wondered who he was.  The next day mother and I were in the station, buying a newspaper, and there was the same gentleman, just going to start by the London train.  Mother remembered she’d seen him walking with Mrs. Baxendale in St. Luke’s, and then we found he’d been staying with the Baxendales all through Emily’s illness.’

‘How did you find it out?  You don’t know the Baxendales.’

‘No, but Mrs. Gadd does, and she told us.’

‘What’s his name?’

‘Mr. Athel—­a queer name, isn’t it?’

Dagworthy was silent.

‘Now you’re cross with me,’ Jessie exclaimed.  ’You’ll tell me, like you did once before, that I’m no good but to pry into other people’s business.’

‘You may pry as much as you like,’ was the murmured reply.

‘Just because you don’t care what I do?’

‘Drink your wine and try to be quiet just for a little.’

‘Why?’

He made no answer, until Jessie asked—­

‘Why does it seem to interest you so much?’

’What?—­all that stuff you’ve been telling me?  I was thinking of something quite different.’

‘Oh!’ exclaimed the girl, blankly.

There was a longer silence.  Jessie let her eyes stray about the room, stealing a glance at Dagworthy occasionally.  Presently he rose, poked the fire with violence, and drank his own wine, which had been waiting so long.

‘I must have out the carriage to send you back,’ he said, going to the window to look at the foul weather.

‘The carriage, indeed!’ protested the girl, with a secret joy.  ’You’ll do no such thing.’

‘I suppose I shall do as I choose,’ he remarked, quietly.  Then he came and rang the bell.

‘You’re not really going to—?’

A servant answered, and the carriage was ordered.

‘Well, certainly that’s one way of getting rid of me,’ Jessie observed.

‘You can stay as long as you please.’

‘But the carriage will be round.’

’Can’t I keep it waiting half through the night if I choose?  I’ve done so before now.  I suppose I’m master in my own house.’

It was strictly true, that, of the carriage.  Once the coachman had been five minutes late on an evening when Dagworthy happened to be ill-tempered.  He bade the man wait at the door, and the waiting lasted through several hours.