day in which he will have Mr. de Crespigny’s fortune. I don’t hope for that quite so much as papa does, Dick; for Mr. de Crespigny may live to be a very, very old man, and it seems so wicked to wish for any one’s death. The day I look forward to is the day when I shall have finished my education, and be able to work for papa. That must be almost better than being rich, I should think, Dick. I can’t imagine any happier fate than to work for those we love.”
Her face brightened as she talked, and she turned to her companion, looking to him for sympathy; but Richard’s head was averted, and he seemed to be staring absently at the houses upon the opposite side of the way.
He was silent for some moments after Eleanor had left off speaking; and then he said, rather abruptly:
“Tell me, my dear, how did you part with your father last night?”
“Why, we had been dining on the Boulevard; and after dinner, papa took me for a long walk, ever so far, past all the theatres, and he had promised to take me to the Ambigu or the Porte Saint Martin; but as we were coming back we met two gentlemen, friends of papa’s, who stopped him and said they had an appointment with him, and persuaded him to go back with them.”
“Back with them! Back where?”
“I mean back towards a big stone gateway we had passed a little time before. I only know they turned that way, but I don’t know where they went. I stood and watched them till they were out of sight.”
“And the two men, what were they like?”
“One of them was a little Frenchman, stout and rosy-faced, with a light moustache and beard like the Emperor’s. He was smartly dressed, and had a cane, which he kept twirling when he talked to papa.”
“Did you hear what he said?”
“No, he spoke in a low voice, and he talked French.”
“But you speak French, Eleanor?”
“Yes, but not as they speak it here. The people seem to talk so fast here, it’s quite difficult to understand them.”
“But the other man, Nell, what was he like?”
“Oh, he was a disagreeable-looking man, and seemed to have a sulky manner, as if he was offended with papa for breaking his appointment, and didn’t care how the matter ended. I scarcely saw his face, at least only for a moment, just long enough to see that he had black eyes, and a thick black moustache. He was tall, and shabbily dressed, and I fancied he was an Englishman, though he never once spoke.”
“He never spoke! It was the Frenchman, then, who persuaded your father to go away with him?”
“Yes.”
“And he seemed very anxious?”
“Oh, yes, very anxious.”
Richard Thornton muttered something between his set teeth, something which sounded like a curse.
“Tell me one thing, Eleanor,” he said. “Your poor father never was too well off, I know. He could not be likely to have much money about him last night. Do you know if he had any?”
“Yes, he had a great deal of money.”
“What do you mean by a great deal? A few pounds, I suppose?”
“Oh, much more than that,” Eleanor answered. “He had a hundred pounds—a hundred pounds in new bank notes, French notes. It was the money my half-sister, Mrs. Bannister, had sent him, to pay for my education at Madame Marly’s.”
“Mrs. Bannister,” said Richard, catching at the name. “Ah, to be sure, I remember now. Mrs. Bannister is your sister. She is very well off, is she not, and has been kind to you? If you were in any trouble, you would go to her, I suppose, Eleanor?”
“Go to her if I were in trouble! Oh, no, no, Dick, not for the world!”
“But why not? She has been kind to you, hasn’t she, Nell?”
“Oh, yes, very kind in paying money for my education, and all that; but you know, Richard, there are some people who seem to do kind things in an unkind manner. If you knew the cruel letter that Mrs. Bannister wrote to papa—the cruel, humiliating things she said only a few days ago, you couldn’t wonder that I don’t like her.”
“But she is your sister, Nell; your nearest relation.”
“Except papa.”
“And she ought to love you, and be kind to you. She lives at Bayswater, I think I’ve heard you say?”
“Yes, in Hyde Park Gardens.”
“To be sure. Mrs. Bannister, Hyde Park Gardens, Bayswater.”
He repeated the name and address, as if he wished to impress them upon his memory.
“I will take you home now, Nell,” he said. “My poor child, you must be tired to death.”
“How can I think about being tired, Richard,” exclaimed Eleanor, “when I am so anxious about papa? Oh, if I only find him at home, what happiness it will be!”
But she hung heavily upon her friend’s arm, and Richard knew that she was very tired. She had been wandering about Paris for several hours, poor child, hither and thither, in the long, unfamiliar streets, following all sorts of unlikely people who looked in the distance something like her father; hoping again and again, only again and again to be disappointed.
They turned into a wider thoroughfare presently, and the scene-painter called the first hackney vehicle which passed him, and lifted Eleanor into it. She was almost fainting with fatigue and exhaustion.
“What have you had to eat to-day, Nell?” he asked.
She hesitated a little, as if she had forgotten what she had eaten, or indeed whether she had eaten at all.
“There was some coffee and a couple of rolls sent for papa this morning. He has his breakfast sent him from a traiteur’s, you know. I had one of the rolls.”
“And you’ve had nothing since?”
