Armstrong flushed angrily at this speech and was about to relieve his mind when Rosalind laughingly interposed--
"Poor old Hodder! You're quite right; I should never have been clever enough to help you. Good-bye. I'm so glad."
To tell the truth, Miss Oliphant was a good deal more engrossed with what the old man had let drop concerning the lost Roger than with the tutor and his knowledge of the law of landlord and tenant.
"Suppose he did not die!" she said, half scared at the boldness of the suggestion. "If he were to come back!" And she went back and looked long once more at the picture. Then with less satisfaction she contemplated her own copy. Thus employed Roger found her when he passed her door an hour later.
"I've done with him, thank you," said Rosalind, handing him back the picture. "See, I have one of my own now."
"Why, it's better than the original. I like it better."
"That shows how little you know about painting."
"It shows how much you know about my brother," said he. "But if you like to keep the original and let me have the copy, I should consider I had the best of the bargain."
Rosalind tossed her head and locked her own copy up in her desk.
"Roger," she said when that was done, "where did he die?"
"The date is on the picture, if one could only make it out. He was abroad at the time, I believe."
"It was before I was born," said he. "Father never spoke of him. But why do you ask?"
"Only a girl's curiosity. I thought, if any one knew, you would. But there is the bell for lunch."
Armstrong meanwhile had been having an interview of a different kind. He strolled into Mr Pottinger's office almost at the same time as that worthy lawyer himself.
"Yes, and quite at your service," said the tutor. "I am afraid my absence has been inconvenient. But I am ready for business now. By the way, I have brought you back a document which must have been left on old Hodder by mistake. I certainly did not sanction it."
The lawyer sat back in his chair and gazed at the tutor through his spectacles. Mr Armstrong, leaning against the chimney-piece, put up his glass and gazed leisurely back. The two men understood one another pretty well already.
"The notice is quite in order. I have Captain Oliphant's instructions."
