‘Ay, and thought it like their impudence.’
‘That will do, my boys,’ said Sir Jasper. ‘Now run away.’
Mr. White put something into each paw as the door was opened and the pair made their exit.
If Sir Jasper acted as advocate, Mr. White seemed to take the position of judge.
‘There can be no doubt,’ he said, ‘that the letter containing the notes reached this house.’
‘No,’ said Mr. Stebbing hotly. ‘Why was I not told? Who cleared the letter-box?’
It was the page’s business, but to remember any particular letter on any particular day was quite beyond him, and he only stared wildly and said, ‘Dun no,’ on which he was dismissed to the lower regions.
‘The address was “Francis Stebbing, Esq.,”’ said Sir Jasper meditatively, perhaps like a spider pulling his cord. ‘Francis--your son’s name. Can he--’
‘Mr. White, I’ll thank you to take care what you say of my son!’ exclaimed Mrs. Stebbing; but there was a blank look of alarm on the father’s face.
‘He may be able to explain’--courtesy and pity made the General add.
‘No, no,’ burst out the mother. ‘He knows nothing of it. Mr. Stebbing, can’t you stand up for your own son?’
‘Perhaps,’ began the poor man, his tone faltering with a terrible anxiety, but his wife exclaimed hastily--
‘He never saw nor heard of it. I put it in the fire.’
There was a general hush, broken by Mr. Stebbing saying slowly--
‘Yes; I saw those disreputable-looking boys put it into the box. I wasn’t going to have that bold girl sending billy-doos on the sly to my son.’
‘Under these circumstances,’ drily said Sir Jasper, ‘I presume that you will think it expedient to withdraw the prosecution.’
‘Certainly, certainly,’ said Mr. Stebbing, in the tone of one delivered from great alarm. ‘I will write at once to my solicitor at Avoncester.’ Then turning on his wife, ‘How was it that I never heard this before, and you let me go and make a fool of myself?’
‘How was I to know, Mr. Stebbing? You started off without a word to me, and all you told me when you came back was that the young man said he had posted the letter to his sister. I should like to know why he could not send it himself to the proper place!’
‘Well, Mrs. Stebbing,’ said her husband, ‘I hope it will be a lesson to you against making free with other people’s letters.’
