“I cannot see why you are interested, Hellington, unless he owes you money too. As a matter of fact, his Trustees have sent me one thousand pounds in notes. I could not think what it was when I picked up the envelope just now, when I came into the Club.”

He held out the opened envelope as he spoke and with it the letter that Thalia had written.

One glance at the writing told the Earl what he wished to know.

“Thank you,” he said. “Do you happen to know Caversham’s address?”

“I cannot remember it,” Lord Dandish replied, “but I expect the porter can tell you. If not, he will doubtless be listed in Debretts.”

“Yes, of course,” the Earl said.

He turned without another word and went from the coffee room leaving Lord Dandish and Richard staring after him in perplexity.

“I don’t mind betting,” Lord Dandish remarked as he closed the envelope that contained the notes, “that Caversham owes Hellington a packet!”

*

Thalia stepped through the French window that opened onto the lawn.

As it was growing late in the afternoon, the sun had lost its strength and she did not need a sunshade to prevent its rays from spoiling the whiteness of her skin.

The gardeners her father had engaged to cut away the wild growth of three years’ neglect were beginning to make the garden look almost as she remembered it.

It had been a shock to see the green velvet lawns that had been there for centuries turned, as her father had said contemptuously ‘into hayfields’ and the shrubs and flowerbeds overgrown until they had almost a jungle-like appearance.

The house seemed to have suffered less from neglect through the years, especially as on Sir Denzil’s instructions the women of the village had already removed the worst of the cobwebs and dust before they arrived.

Like a Commander directing operations in the field of battle, Sir Denzil had begun to redecorate and refurnish the house as he and his wife had always longed to do.

Thalia lost count of the items he ordered from tradesmen who flocked to The Manor eagerly, once it was known that he required their services.

It was not only that he wanted everything around him to be as fine and grand as he had always wished it to be, it was also, Thalia, knew, an almost childish delight in being able to spend, spend, spend as he had never been able to do before in the whole of his life.

The story of his adventures in America left his wife and his daughter breathless and, because he was so excited about them himself, it was hard for Thalia at times not to believe that she was listening to some boys’ adventure story rather than a tale of persistence and sheer good luck.