The tone was penitent.  Tatham, forgetting all thoughts of admonition, reassured her.

“You didn’t give any.  Except—­Your mother of course was very anxious about you.”

“But I couldn’t tell her!” sighed the voice on his shoulder.  “She’d have stopped it.”

Tatham smiled unseen.

“I’m afraid your father wasn’t kind to you,” he said, after a pause.

“It was horrible—­horrible!” The little body he held shuddered closer to him.  “Why does he hate us so? and I lost my temper too—­I stamped at him.  But he looks so old—­so old!  I think he’ll die soon.”

“That would be happiest,” said Tatham, gravely.

“I told him we would never take any money from him again.  I must earn it—­I will!  Your mother will lend me a little—­for my training.  I’ll pay it back.”

“You poor child!” he murmured.

At that moment they emerged upon the last section of the broad avenue leading to the house.  And the electric light in the pillared porch threw long rays toward them.

“Please put me down,” said Felicia, with decision.  “I can walk quite well.”

He obeyed her.  But her weakness was still such, that she could only walk with help.  Guiding, supporting her, he half led, half carried her along.

As they reached the lighted porch, she looked up, her face sparkling with rain, a touch of mischief in her hollow-ringed eyes.

“How much will they scold?”

“Can’t say, I am sure!  I think you’ll have to bear it.”

“Never mind!” Her white cheeks dimpled.  “It’s Duddon!  I’d rather be scolded at Duddon, than petted anywhere else.”

Tatham flushed suddenly.  So did she.  And as the door opened Felicia walked with composure past the stately butler.

“Is Lady Tatham in the library?”

Netta Melrose, full of fears, wept that evening over her daughter’s rash disobedience.  Victoria administered what reproof she could; and Felicia was reduced to a heated defence of herself, sitting up in bed, with a pair of hot cheeks and tearful eyes.  But when all the lights were out, and she was alone, she thought no more of any such nips and pricks.  The night was joy around her, and as she sank to sleep; Tatham, in dream, still held her, still carried her through the darkness and the rain.

XX

While Felicia was making her vain attempt upon her father’s pity, Faversham was sitting immersed in correspondence in his own room at the farther end of the gallery.  He heard nothing of the girl’s arrival or departure.  Sound travelled but little through the thick walls of the Tower, and the gallery, muffled with rich carpets, with hangings and furniture, deadened both step and voice.

The agent was busy with some typewritten evidence that Melrose was preparing wherewith to fight the Government officials now being sent down from London to inquire into the state of some portion of the property.  The evidence had been collected by Nash, and Faversham read it with disgust.  He knew well that the great mass of it was perjured stuff, bought at a high price.  Yet both in public and private he would have to back up all the lies and evasions that his master, and the pack of obscure hangers-on who lived upon his pay, chose to put forward.