When she left him he stood and watched her upright figure disappear
through the ivy-grown door of the kitchen gardens with a disturbed
but elated expression on his countenance. He did not know why he felt
elated, but he was conscious of elation. Something new had walked
into the place. He stopped his work and grinned and scratched his head
several times after he went back to his pottering among the cabbage
plants.
"My word," he muttered. "She's a fine, straight young woman. If she
was her ladyship things 'ud be different. Sir Nigel 'ud be different,
too--or there'd be some fine upsets."
There was a huge stable yard, and Betty passed through that on her way
back. The door of the carriage house was open and she saw two or three
tumbled-down vehicles. One was a landau with a wheel off, one was a
shabby, old-fashioned, low phaeton. She caught sight of a patently
venerable cob in one of the stables. The stalls near him were empty.
"I suppose that is all they have to depend upon," she thought. "And the
stables are like the gardens."
She found Lady Anstruthers and Ughtred waiting for her upon the terrace,
each of them regarding her with an expression suggestive of repressed
curiosity as she approached.
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