Oh, anything was better than this! Dashing from my room I joined one of the groups into which the single large circle had now broken up. The house had been lighted from end to end, and some effort had been made at a more respectable appearance by such persons as I now saw; some even were fully dressed. All were engaged in discussing the one great topic. Listening and not listening, I waited for the front door bell to ring. It sounded while one woman was saying to another:
"The Sinclairs will now be able to take their honeymoon on their own yacht."
I made my way to where I could watch Sinclair while the physicians were in the room. I thought his face looked very noble. The narrowness of his own escape, the sympathy for me which the event, so much worse than either of us anticipated, had awakened in his generous breast, had called out all that was best in his naturally reserved and not-always-to-be-understood nature. A tower of strength he was to me that hour. I knew that mercy and mercy only would influence his conduct. He would be guilty of no rash or inconsiderate act. He would give this young girl a chance.
Therefore when the physicians had pronounced the case one of apoplexy (a conclusion most natural under the circumstances), and the excitement which had held together the various groups of uneasy guests had begun to subside, it was with perfect confidence I saw him approach and address Gilbertine. She was standing fully dressed at the stairhead, where she had stopped to hold some conversation with the retiring physicians; and the look she gave him in return and the way she moved off in obedience to his command or suggestion assured me that he was laying plans for an interview with Dorothy. Consequently I was quite ready to obey him when he finally stepped up to me and said:
"Go below, and if you find the library empty, as I have no doubt you will, light one gas-jet and see that the door to the conservatory is unlocked. I require a place in which to make Gilbertine comfortable while I have some words with her cousin."
"But how will you be able to influence Miss Camerden to come down?" Somehow, the familiar name of Dorothy would not pass my lips. "Do you think she will recognize your right to summon her to an interview?"
"Yes."
I had never seen his lip take that firm line before, yet I had always known him to be a man of great resolution.
"But how can you reach her? She is shut up in her own room, under the care, I am told, of Mrs. Armstrong's maid."
"I know, but she will escape that dreadful place as soon as her feet will carry her. I shall wait in the hall till she is seen to enter it, then I will say 'Come!' and she will come, attended by Gilbertine."