“Poor dear girl!” cried Mrs. St. John Deloraine, with the ready tears in her eyes; for this lady spontaneously acted on the injunction to weep with those who weep, and also laugh with those who laugh.
Mr. Cranley, who was beginning to feel hungry, led her thoughts off to the latest farce in which Mr. Toole had amused the town; and when Mrs. St. John Deloraine had giggled till she wept again over her memories of this entertainment, she suddenly looked at her watch.
“Why, he’s very late,” she said; “and yet it is not far to come from the Hit or Miss.”
“From the Hit or Miss!” cried Mr. Cranley, much louder than he was aware.
“Yes; you may well wonder, if you don’t know about it, that I should have asked a gentleman from a public-house to meet you. But you will be quite in love with him; he is such a very good young man. Not handsome, nor very amusing; but people think a great deal too much of amusingness now. He is very, very good, and spends almost all his time among the poor. He is a Fellow of his College at Oxford.”
During this discourse Mr. Cranley was pretending to play with the terrier; but, stoop as he might, his face was livid, and he knew it.
“Did I tell you his name?” Mrs. St. John Deloraine ran on. “He is a—”
Here the door was opened, and the servant announced “Mr. Maitland.”
When Mrs. St. John Deloraine had welcomed her new guest, she turned, and found that Mr. Cranley was looking out of the window.
His position was indeed agonizing, and, in the circumstances, a stronger heart might have blanched at the encounter.