Part 25 (1/2)

”Then will you trust me because your mother does? will you believe that when I come back I shall be in a position to set all her fears and yours also absolutely at rest? I am certain of this, I go away with a hope which I dare not express more fully; I shall come back trusting that that hope may be fulfilled in all its magnificence for myself. I cannot say more at present. I long to, but I dare not. Will you trust me? will you try to understand? Why, what is the matter?”

He turned and looked at me abruptly. Quick sobs were coming from my lips. I suddenly and unexpectedly lost my self-control.

”I shall be all right in a minute,” I said. ”I have gone through much to-day; it is--it is on account of mother. Don't--don't speak for a moment.”

He did not, he stood near me. When I had recovered he said gently--

”Give me your promise. I wish I could say more, much, much more, but will you trust me in the dark?”

”I will,” I replied. ”I am sorry you are going. Thank you for being kind to mother; come back when you can.”

”You may be certain on that point,” he replied. ”I leave England with extreme unwillingness. Thank you for what you have promised.”

He held out his hand and I gave him mine. I felt my heart beat as my hand lay for a moment in his, his fingers closed firmly over it, then he slowly dropped it. We went back to the house.

A few days afterwards Mr. Randolph went away. He went quite quietly, without making the slightest commotion. He just entered the drawing-room quickly one morning after breakfast, and shook hands with mother and shook hands with me, and said that he would be back again before either of us had missed him, and then went downstairs, and I watched behind the curtain as his luggage was put on the roof of the cab. I watched him get in. Jane Mullins was standing near. He shook hands with her. He did not once glance up at our windows, the cab rolled out of the Square and was lost to view. Then I turned round.

There were tears in mother's eyes.

”He is the nicest fellow I have ever met,” she said, ”I am so very sorry that he has gone.”

”Well, Mummy darling,” I answered, ”you are more my care than ever now.”

”Oh, I am not thinking of myself,” said mother. She looked up at me rather uneasily. It seemed to me as if her eyes wanted to read me through, and I felt that I did not want her to read me through; I did not want any one to read what my feelings were that day.

Jane Mullins came bustling up.

”It is a lovely morning, and your mother must have a drive,” she said.

”I have ordered a carriage. It will be round in half-an-hour. You and she are to drive in the Park and be back in time for lunch, and see here, Mrs. Wickham, I want you to taste this. I have made it from a receipt in the new invalid cookery book. I think you will say that you never tasted such soup before.”

”Oh, you quite spoil me, Jane,” said mother, but she took the soup which Jane had prepared so delicately for her, and I ran off, glad to be by myself for a few moments.

At dinner that day Mrs. Fanning and Mrs. Armstrong sat side by side.

Mrs. Fanning had taken a great fancy to Mrs. Armstrong, and they usually during the meal sat with their heads bent towards one another, talking eagerly, and often glancing in the direction of Albert Fanning and Miss Armstrong and me. Mrs. Fanning had an emphatic way of bobbing her head whenever she looked at me, and after giving me a steady glance, her eyes involuntarily rolled round in the direction of Mr.

Fanning.

I was so well aware of these glances that I now never pretended to see them, but not one of them really escaped my notice. After dinner that evening the good lady came up to my side.

”Well, my dear, well,” she said, ”and how are you bearing up?”

”Bearing up?” I answered, ”I don't quite understand.”

Now of course no one in the boarding-house was supposed to know anything whatever with regard to mother's health. The consultation of the doctors had been so contrived that the princ.i.p.al boarders had been out when it took place, therefore I knew that Mrs. Fanning was not alluding to the doctors. She sat down near me.

”Ah,” she said, ”I thought, and I told my dear son Albert, that a man of that sort would not stay very long. You are bearing up, for you are a plucky sort of girl, but you must be feeling it a good bit. I am sorry for you, you have been a silly girl, casting your eyes at places too high for you, and never seeing those good things which are laid so to speak at your very feet. You are like all the rest of the world, but if you think that my Albert will put up with other people's leavings, you are finely mistaken.”

”Really, Mrs. Fanning,” I answered, ”I am completely at a loss to know what you are talking about.”

Here I heard Mrs. Armstrong's hearty and coa.r.s.e laugh in my ear.