"No. It is quite as well. Fix your own plans; and I will supply the money."
She looked wistfully into his face, longing for a touch of the old kindness. "If I thought you wanted me, I would rather—rather stay here."
No softening came into the set features. "I could wish it on one condition," he said. "That condition you know. When you resolve to speak out, in plain confession—but until then intercourse is only pain to me. It is better that you should be away."
Then as usual, he broke the conversation off, and Lettice had to struggle with rebellious tears. The change in him was hardest of all to bear. Keith, now nearly ten years old, but small, pretty, and childish, not to say babyish, for his years, made no small outcry over the prospect of losing his playfellow. She never minded trouble, and was always unselfishly ready for an active game, when it suited him; and perhaps nobody had realised, Lettice least of all, what a difference her absence would make in the boy's life. Keith himself saw it instantly; and from that moment he flung aside his usual caution, lavishing kisses and caresses upon her, in a manner which brought chronic blackness to the brow of Theodosia.
For years, Theodosia had done her best to spoil the child. It never so much as occurred to her that, in later years, she would herself pay the penalty for this mode of training. She could not endure to part with him, even for his good; and she sent him daily to a small second-rate school, a mile off, instead of consenting to place him, as Dr. Bryant wished, at a first-class Bristol school. At home, she gave in to all his fancies, seldom enforcing obedience.
Theodosia counted that she and she alone had main possession of her boy's heart; but suddenly now she found that, despite all her efforts, his chief delight was in Lettice. In his indignant distress at the thought of losing his companion, he made no secret of the fact, but openly declared that "nobody" could be what Lettice was. Even while afraid of consequences, Lettice could not but find pleasure in the avowal.
She spent some serious thought over her answer to Prue. If the Valentines knew of the cloud under which she lay, would they wish to have her still? True, the accusation was undeserved, and she could scarcely be bound to tell of it: but she chose the safe side, and a touching little letter went off:—
"I shall love to come, if you will have me," she wrote. "I could get away on Friday or Saturday, if that is not too soon for you. But I must explain first about what has happened lately. They believe here that I have done such a dreadful thing. I am accused of stealing a £20 bank-note. Mrs. Bryant left the note lying about, and it disappeared, and after some time it was found locked up in one of my boxes.
"I did not do it, Prue dear: and I cannot imagine how the note came there. Only, there it was: and even my dear uncle now thinks that I took it. I have been very unhappy. Will you believe me? Or had I better stay away? I do long for your kind faces: only I could not bear to come among you all, and to have you doubt my word, or think that I could do such a thing. So please tell me what to do.
"I have not mentioned this to Felix, because I knew how much it would worry him."
Prue's answer, by return of post, was decisive.
"Come, and you shall have a welcome," she wrote. "Come on Friday, by all means. I have told my mother of your trouble, and no one else. We believe you perfectly. Poor child how you must have been tried!"