Pamela again felt an overwhelming conviction that here was one merely as naughty and as innocent as a child.
“Oh, my dear!” she exclaimed, and caught her forcibly into her own strong warm arms. There was more than a touch of the mother in Pamela; she never could bear to leave suffering uncomforted. “Why, in the name of God, did you leave your own husband?”
The Mad Brat screamed as if the last word had been a blow.
“Oh, oh, my Fred!”
Pamela cast a look over the bride’s heaving shoulder at Mr. Bellairs.
“There, sir!” she said severely, “there’s for you and your vanity! For you, and the others, who are so ready to think that any lady who so much as smiles on you is mad in love with you—and all the while you’re but the catspaw of her jealousy!”
“Pamela!” cried Jocelyn Bellairs. He had been standing, very ill at ease, struggling with the variety of his emotions. He now broke into laughter which had yet something of wrath in it. “I’ve been a confounded fool! And I swear you are an angel! Oh, confusion! I can’t bear to hear a woman cry. But I must say Joseph himself would have been tempted by that little—devil, this morning!”
“Hush!” cried the milliner, rocking the weeping Selina as if it had been a baby, but shooting another glance at Mr. Bellairs which, after all, held more indulgence than resentment. “Hush, sir! Leave me with her Ladyship. Go, refresh yourself with a tankard of cool ale, after your dusty drive—and send the landlady hither with the hartshorn.”
If Mr. Bellairs had thought highly of Pamela before, he now told himself she was the pattern of true women. He paused but to kiss the firm, capable, white hand she extended to him, and then hastily closed the door between himself and those distressing vapours.
“Now, my dear,” coaxed Pamela, “I see how it is. You’ve had a quarrel with that elegant young officer of yours. You’ve had a quarrel, and you went off in a huff with that dark, bad old Colonel——”