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They all trooped into the dining-room, but Timmy was the only one who did full justice to the cakes and scones which had been made specially in Godfrey Radmore's honour: all the others felt cross and disappointed, especially Tom and Rosamund, who had given up going to a tennis-party.
He saw that she had been crying, and his heart welled up with tenderness, and with angry, impatient annoyance against Radmore's presence. Why didn't the stupid fellow go? Surely he must realise, surely there must be something in the atmosphere, which must tell even the blindest of onlookers, how things were between him, Jack Tosswill, and the invalid?
Just now, in the moment of meeting, he had avoided asking Betty about George. Betty's twin had been away at the time of Radmore's break with Old Place away in a sense which in our civilised days can only be brought about by one thing, an infectious illness.
They had been such pals in spite of the four years' difference between them. Radmore and Timmy were now in the kind of annex or wing which had been added some fifty years after the original mansion had been built. The lower floor of this annex consisted of one big room which, even in the days of Radmore's first acquaintance with the Tosswills, was only used in warm weather.
And there welled up in Radmore's heart the strangest feeling of tenderness not only for Timmy but for the whole of the Tosswill family not only for the Tosswill family, but for the whole of this sturdy, quiet, apparently unemotional world of England to which he had come back. The human mind and brain work in mysterious ways.
Fortunately, from the two conspirators' point of view, there were only old-fashioned stables at Old Place, and Radmore's car was kept in the village in a barn which had been cleverly transformed by the blacksmith into a rough garage.
If only Tremaine had Radmore's money, even only a portion of his money, how gladly she would leave England behind her, and start a new, free, delightful life in India! Tremaine knew the kind of grand, smart people she longed to know. He was staying with some of them now.
Such was the woman to whom Betty Tosswill had thought it just as well to go herself with the news of Godfrey Radmore's coming visit to Old Place, and as she walked slowly up the village street, the girl tried to remind herself that Miss Pendarth had a very kind side to her nature.
She shut the door, and going over to the roomy old sofa, sat down, and leaning back, closed her eyes. It was a very unusual thing for her to do, but she felt tired, and painfully excited at the thought of Godfrey Radmore's coming visit. And as she lay there, there rose up before her, wearily and despondently, the changes which nine years had brought to Old Place.
Then she was awakened from this dream of bliss by Radmore's next words: "My godson's going to write you a letter of apology," he said. And then, to her chagrin, he took his hand away; it was as though Timmy's malign influence had fallen between them. His very tone changed; it was no longer tender, solicitous only kindly. "Mr. Radmore, I want to tell you something. I'm horribly afraid of Timmy!"
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