"No." Lettice gazed straight before her, and forced a short laugh. "Why should any one?"
"Not intentionally; but people sometimes cause pain, not knowing it. Or, perhaps, you are not well. Is that it?"
"O no."
"Tell me: will you not?" urged Mr. Kelly. "Something is wrong, I am sure. I should like to help you, but how can I, if you do not tell me your trouble? Perhaps I could do something. Try to think of me as a friend, and speak freely."
Lettice made an effort. "If—if—if you will promise—" she began, and then a tearless sob broke into the words, and she fled along the passage out of sight.
Mr. Kelly looked after her compassionately, but she did not return. The echo of that heartbroken sob haunted him for hours after.
* * * * * *
"Mind, Lettice, I mean what I say. You can't help going with Sissie, of course. It has to be: and I suppose, as things are, that there is nothing else to be done. She will not be fit for work again for months; and she never ought to slave as she has done. But you are not to count that house your home. Just a 'temporary residence,' as people say—not a real home.
"After the way Dr. Bryant treated my father—It's all very well his showing kindness to us now, when my father is dead! Why couldn't he be kind in my father's lifetime, I should like to know? Anyhow, I don't mean you to belong to Dr. Bryant; though, of course, one has to be grateful for what he is doing."
Felix spoke in masterful accents, striding along the Parade, and Lettice kept pace with him. She had lain awake all night, gazing with troubled eyes into the happy childhood of her past, and into the uncertain future; and in one night, she seemed to herself to have grown years older. To-day the weight of foreboding was on her heavily, and exertion was a struggle; but the last thing she thought of was to make complaint.