Lady Phipps dropped her hands slowly, and a strange look came to her eyes.
"You talk wildly, Elizabeth," she said, in a faltering voice.
"She came between him and heaven when he stood by the altar to be baptized. You did not see her; no one saw her, I think, except myself; but the cup of wine trembled in his hand, he grew pale as death. It was her shadow touching him as she passed up the aisle."
"I remember this. He did grow pale; I never saw my husband tremble before. But it was a solemn occasion, and Sir William felt it deeply. If this lady was present, I am sure he did not know it."
Lady Phipps spoke half to her own thoughts, half to the young girl, who lay sobbing in her lap; seized with regret for the words she had spoken the moment their effect became visible in the features and voice of her benefactress.
"I think no one saw her but myself and Norman," sobbed the girl. "She stood back from the altar, and did not come out with the rest. It seemed to me as if the house grew darker when she entered it. Oh, Lady Phipps—Lady Phipps, she is a terrible woman!"
The lady was too just and generous for these wild denunciations to influence her; but she grew watchful of her guest, and the distrust floating in her mind after this conversation deepened almost to dislike before her husband returned.
Keenly, almost as Elizabeth herself, she watched the intimacy which had sprung up between Barbara and the young secretary—an intimacy that seemed to have shut her out from the young man's regard almost as completely as it had separated him from Elizabeth.
Barbara Stafford was unconscious of the bitter feelings which her presence in that house had brought to life. Preoccupied by many painful thoughts, she gave herself no opportunities for observation. She did not remark that every hour threw her more and more into the society of the youth; and that her intercourse with the ladies contracted itself almost to the commonest courtesies of life.
One evening Barbara and Norman came up from the garden as usual, when the dusk had closed in upon them, and seated themselves in the front portico. Elizabeth was alone on one of the side seats when they came up. She had become used to this kind of solitude now, and rather sought it than otherwise. The young are always ready to convert sorrow into martyrdom.