" The little person had
really no definite knowledge of how Lord Coombe was concerned,
but certain servants' whisperings of names and mysterious phrases
had conveyed quite an enjoyable effect of unknown iniquity connected
with his lordship.
Robin said nothing to Dowson, but walked up and down the paths
reflecting and building a slow fire which would continue to burn
in her young heart. She had by then passed the round, soft baby
period and had entered into that phase when bodies and legs grow
long and slender and small faces lose their first curves and begin
to show sharper modeling.
Accepting the situation in its entirety, Dowson had seen that it
was well to first reach Lord Coombe with any need of the child's.
Afterwards, the form of presenting it to Mrs. Gareth-Lawless must
be gone through, but if she were first spoken to any suggestion
might be forgotten or intentionally ignored.
Dowson became clever in her calculations as to when his lordship
might be encountered and where--as if by chance, and therefore,
quite respectfully. Sometimes she remotely wondered if he himself
did not make such encounters easy for her. But his manner never
altered in its somewhat stiff, expressionless chill of indifference.
He never was kindly in his manner to the child if he met her.
Dowson felt him at once casual and "lofty." Robin might have been
a bit of unconsidered rubbish, the sight of which slightly bored
him.
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