"Can I--Would it be possible for me to see her?"
Miss Palliser did not answer.
"I wouldn"t dream of asking her, except that I"ve got something on my mind."
"And she--my dear man, she"s got everything on her mind."
"I know. I--I want to see her on business."
Miss Palliser"s lithe figure grew rigid. She turned on him a look of indignation and contempt. "Everybody wants to see her on business. But some of them have had the grace to wait."
He smiled in the faint tolerant manner of a man so steeped in the bitterness of the situation that no comment on it can add a further sting.
"I can"t wait. My business hasn"t much to do with me; but it has a great deal to do with Miss Harden."
She looked at him as he spoke. Something in his face and in his voice too made her feel that her judgement of him had been unspeakably, unpardonably coa.r.s.e.
"I beg your pardon," she said gently.
"Oh don"t. I"m not surprised that you thought that of me."
"I didn"t think it. I don"t quite know what I"m saying. I"ve spent the last two days trying to keep fools from worrying her. I hate the people who want to go to her; I hate the people who keep away; I hate them all. But I"m sorry I spoke like that to you. You look horribly ill."
"I"m not ill. But I"m nearly out of my mind about this business."
"What is it? Tell me, has it anything to do with the library?
"Yes."
"Well; the library"s going to be sold."
"I know. That"s what I want to speak to her about."
"There"s not a bit of good in speaking to her. There are at this moment," said Kitty incisively, "two persons in the house who call themselves the men in possession."
"The brutes--"
"You may as well sit down. You can"t turn them out, they"re two to one, and their position is, I believe, legally sound."
"I must go to her at once--I knew this would happen--Miss Palliser, is any one with her?"
"I am with her. I"m going back to her in a minute; but I want to talk to you first. Everybody"s looking at us, but that can"t be helped. Did you say you _knew_ this would happen?"
"Yes--Miss Palliser, I"m in the most intolerable position with regard to Miss Harden."
"You knew they were making these arrangements?"
"Oh yes, I knew it all the time I was working for her. What"s more, I"m supposed to be the agent for the sale."
"Well--if it"s got to be sold, why not?"
"Well, you see, my father"s only an ordinary dealer. I"m about the only person concerned who knows the real value and I know that it"s been undervalued. Of course, without the smallest dishonesty on Mr.
Pilkington"s part."
"Mr. who?" Kitty had not yet heard of Mr. Pilkington.
"Pilkington."
"What"s his address?"
He gave it her.
Kitty made a note of the name and address.
"Unfortunately Mr. Pilkington has an absolute right to sell it, and my father has an absolute right to buy it."
"Well, somebody"s got to buy it, I suppose?"
"Yes, but it seems to me we oughtn"t to do anything till we know whether any of Miss Harden"s people will come forward."
"She is the last of her people."
"How about Mr. Jewdwine? He"s her cousin."
"On her mother"s side."
"Still he"s her cousin. I wrote to him ten days ago; and I haven"t got any answer as yet."
"What did you say to him?"
"I invited him to step in and buy the library over our heads."
"And how much would he have had to pay for it?"
"Probably more than one thousand two hundred."
"Well--if you think that Mr. Jewdwine is the man to deal so lightly with two hundred pounds, let alone the thousand! Really, that"s the quaintest thing you"ve done yet. May I ask if this is the way you generally do business?"
"No, I can"t say that it is."
"Well, well, you were very safe."
"Safe? I don"t want to be safe. Don"t you see how horrible it is for me? I"d give anything if he or anyone else would come in now and walk over us."
"Still, I don"t wonder that you got no answer to your very remarkable proposal."
"It seemed to me a very simple and obvious proposal."