"He won't hurry himself. He never does, I fancy. I had a letter from him this morning about Miss Amedroz."
"He desired me to send her seventy-five pounds,--the interest of her aunt's money."
"Seventy-five pounds!" said Will Belton, contemptuously.
"He thought she might want money at once; and I sent her the cheque to-day. It will go down by the same train that carries you."
"Seventy-five pounds! And you are sure that he has not gone himself?"
"It isn't likely that he should have written to me, and passed through London himself, at the same time;--but it is possible, no doubt. I don't think he even knew the old squire; and there is no reason why he should go to the funeral."
"No reason at all," said Belton,--who felt that Captain Aylmer's presence at the Castle would be an insult to himself. "I don't know what on earth he should do there,--except that I think him just the fellow to intrude where he is not wanted." And yet Will was in his heart despising Captain Aylmer because he had not already hurried down to the assistance of the girl whom he professed to love.
"He is engaged to her, you know," said the lawyer, in a low voice.
"What difference does that make with such a fellow as he is, a cold-blooded fish of a man, who thinks of nothing in the world but being respectable? Engaged to her! Oh, damn him!"
"I've not the slightest objection. I don't think, however, that you'll find him at Belton before you. No doubt she will have heard from him; and it strikes me as very possible that she may go to Aylmer Park."
"Would it not be the best place for her?"
"No. My house would be the best place for her. I am her nearest relative. Why should she not come to us?"
Mr. Green turned round his chair and poked the fire, and fidgeted about for some moments before he answered. "My dear fellow, you must know that that wouldn't do." He then said, "You ought to feel that it wouldn't do;--you ought indeed."
"Why shouldn't my sister receive Miss Amedroz as well as that old woman down in Yorkshire?"
"Because Miss Amedroz is engaged to be married to that old woman's son, and is not engaged to be married to your sister's brother. The thing is done, and what is the good of interfering. As far as she is concerned, a great burden is off your hands."