The Leader of the House of Commons turned from white to pink. Lucy might have been talking about her. She wore a very pretty white gown of some soft silky stuff, and it was folded across the bosom, and the folds heaved up and down as Lucy spoke, as if she were breathing heavily.
'Perhaps he has done this for a woman's sake,' she said bitterly. 'Men are such fools! they will do anything for a woman's sake—not always a worthy woman.'
'I am sure he has not!' said Lucy hotly. 'He has been working too hard, and he has broken down. I heard at the lodge that he was working ten hours a day; that he was certain to come out first. Oh, you don't know how they are building upon him at St. Benedict's! It isn't a woman—it's overwork.'
Pamela smiled.
'You are a capital champion, my dear, only don't suffer yourself to get too much interested in this foolish young man; it will interfere with your work. You must not make a mistake and let pity drift into—love.'
She made a little pause before the word, and the colour came again into her cheeks. She looked ever so much prettier talking about pity—and love—than she did speaking on those troublesome Bills that had already occupied the time of two Sessions.
'Oh, he is never likely to love me!' said Lucy. 'He could only love his equal; no one else would have any influence over him. He would only love a queen among women.'
'Perhaps he has found his queen already. Most men have before they are twenty-three.'
The colour went out of the girl's face, and the cold light came back into her eyes, and her lips, that a moment before were tremulous and tender, were hard and firm.
'I wouldn't go too often to Mr. Edgell's rooms, if I were you, dear,' she said when she went away. 'The authorities would make a fuss if they heard of it. We are not supposed, you know, to visit a man's room without a chaperon. I don't think it would do to take a chaperon there. If you have any more interest in him, I will find out for you how he is going on from Eric.'