She interrupted him in her turn, and as quickly:
“Oh, no, indeed do not think that because of what she said I should seek such protestation from you. But David, though I came here because it was the only refuge open to me, I could not stay unless I had a task to do. I saw last night—before I had been in dear old Bindon an hour—that sadly you want one honest servant here. Let me be that servant to your house; let me be at least now what Aunt Sophia was. I can do the work.”
She had flushed and paled as she spoke, but gained confidence towards the end; and she looked what she felt herself to be, a strong, capable woman.
His eye dwelt upon her, not as last night in exaltation that amounted to hallucination, but as one whose deep and restless sadness finds an unsought peace.
“Will you, indeed?” he said at last. “Will you indeed take under your gracious care my poor, neglected house?”
Their eyes met again. It was a silent compact. After a little pause:
“Do you not think I am very brave to be ready to face Margery?” she asked, with a mischievous dimple.
At this his rare smile flashed out—that smile before which she felt, as she had already over-night, that, in her heart, she abdicated.
“Oh, I know Margery well,” he said, “but her husband was my father’s faithful man, and to keep her was a promise to his dying ears. She knows it and trades on it. I am not—do not believe it,” he added, “quite the lunatic cousin Simon would make me out. At least, I have my lucid moments. This is one. I have profited by it.”
“So have I,” said Ellinor with a lovely smile of gratitude that robbed the words of any flippancy.