“My lady will see you in her own room—walk this way,” said the man, returning promptly, after delivering his message. He ushered the stranger up stairs with great deference, and opened the door with a bow, altogether forgetting the package which the man carried.
Mrs. Lambert was struggling to compose herself; but she had been greatly excited, and every nerve in her frame quivered. She tried to speak, but the effort only brought tears into her eyes.
Ross did not take the hand held out to him with such timid hesitation; but laid his bundle on a chair, then turned a sternly agitated face upon the trembling woman.
“Elizabeth, I have come to ask you a question.”
“I will answer it, Herman! There is nothing you can ask that I will not reply to. But first,—do not misunderstand me; I ask it for—for the sake of my step-son. Answer the one question that I asked you.—Is that girl, I mean Eva Laurence, anything to you?”
“Anything to me—and you ask this? Yes, everything!”
“You love her, then?”
“Yes, better than my own soul.”
“But—but you cannot marry her. It would be——”
The woman’s lips turned deadly white, and what she might have said died upon them.