Part 68 (1/2)
”And you finished the litigation?”
”Easily. A little give and take, and the thing was done.”
”More give than take, I am told.”
”Perhaps so, but better that than fighting, and bad blood, and ruinous lawyers' fees.”
Mr. Graythorne winced and grew red in the face, and before he could recover himself Rufus had slipped out of the room.
It did not take him long to reach the street in which Madeline lived. He looked down its long length and gave a little sigh of relief. It was not a street of mansions. It was unpretentious and comparatively obscure.
His heart was beating very fast when he walked slowly up the steps and rang the door-bell. He felt as though the supreme moment of his life had come.
He was shown into a room that harmonised with the street, quiet, cosy, comfortable, but quite unpretentious. He had not to wait many moments.
Almost before he had time to turn round, the door was pushed open, and Madeline stood before him, bright, winning, smiling, and radiantly beautiful.
There was no trace of stiffness or embarra.s.sment in her manner. Indeed, her greeting was more cordial than he had dared hope for. The embarra.s.sment was on his side; he felt he had undertaken a task that would tax all his nerve.
”It is like old times to see you again,” she said, in her old frank, ingenuous way. ”Do you remember our last long walk over the downs?”
”Then you have not forgotten?” he replied, with a little sigh of relief.
”Why should I forget? I was so sorry not to see you again.”
”I looked out for you once or twice; then I heard you had gone away.”
”Did you look out for me? And I wanted so particularly to see you.”
”Yes?” he questioned, eagerly.
”I wanted to let you know that I had discovered Gervase Tregony's perfidy.”
”Before you went away?”
”Yes; but I was unable to make it known. However, all the truth has come out since.”
”You have heard?”
”Oh, yes. I get Cornish news regularly.”
”Then you knew I had left?”
”Oh, yes,” she answered, with a blush and a smile, ”I knew that also.”
”I came to look after that disputed property of my father's I once told you about,” he said, after a pause.
”Yes, I remember. You said you had given up all hope of ever getting a penny.”
”You see, my grandfather and I were too far away to look after it, and too poor to fight it. So it was just hung up. You have heard, perhaps, that it has turned out well?”