"Not quite. In a quarter of an hour, they say."

The housekeeper, with a word of impatience at the laundry's delay, went
out and crossed the yard towards it. Frederick Massingbird turned again
to Rachel.

"Roy seemed to be grumbling at you."

"He accused me of being the cause of his son's going away. He thinks I
ought to have noticed him."

Frederick Massingbird made no reply. He raised his finger and gently
rubbed it round and round the mark upon his cheek: a habit he had
acquired when a child, and they could not entirely break him of it. He
was seven-and-twenty years of age now, but he was sure to begin rubbing
that mark unconsciously, if in deep thought. Rachel resumed, her tone a
covert one, as if the subject on which she was about to speak might not
be breathed, even to the walls.

"Roy hinted that his son was going to foreign lands. I did not choose to
let him see that I knew anything, so remarked that I had heard he was
gone to London. 'London!' he answered; 'that was only the first
halting-place on the journey!'"

"Did he give any hint about John?"

"Not a word," replied Rachel. "He would not be likely to do that."

"No. Roy can keep counsel, whatever other virtues he may run short of.