"I don't know what to think," said Mrs. Marsham.
The waltzers went on till they were stopped by want of breath. "I am so much out of practice," said Lady Glencora; "I didn't think—I should have been able—to dance at all." Then she put up her face, and slightly opened her mouth, and stretched her nostrils,—as ladies do as well as horses when the running has been severe and they want air.
"You'll take another turn," said he.
"Presently," said she, beginning to have some thought in her mind as to whether Mrs. Marsham was watching her. Then there was a little pause, after which he spoke in an altered voice.
"Does it put you in mind of old days?" said he.
It was, of course, necessary for him that he should bring her to some thought of the truth. It was all very sweet, that dancing with her, as they used to dance, without any question as to the reason why it was so; that sudden falling into the old habits, as though everything between this night and the former nights had been a dream; but this would not further his views. The opportunity had come to him which he must use, if he intended ever to use such opportunity. There was the two hundred pounds in his pocket, which he did not intend to give back. "Does it put you in mind of 'old days?'" he said.
The words roused her from her sleep at once, and dissipated her dream. The facts all rushed upon her in an instant; the letter in her pocket; the request which she had made to Alice, that Alice might be induced to guard her from this danger; the words which her husband had spoken to her in the morning, and her anger against him in that he had subjected her to the eyes of a Mrs. Marsham; her own unsettled mind—quite unsettled whether it would be best for her to go or to stay! It all came upon her now at the first word of tenderness which Burgo spoke to her.
It has often been said of woman that she who doubts is lost,—so often that they who say it now, say it simply because others have said it before them, never thinking whether or no there be any truth in the proverb. But they who have said so, thinking of their words as they were uttered, have known but little of women. Women doubt every day, who solve their doubts at last on the right side, driven to do so, some by fear, more by conscience, but most of them by that half-prudential, half-unconscious knowledge of what is fitting, useful, and best under the cirumstances, which rarely deserts either men or women till they have brought themselves to the Burgo Fitzgerald state of recklessness. Men when they have fallen even to that, will still keep up some outward show towards the world; but women in this condition defy the world, and declare themselves to be children of perdition. Lady Glencora was doubting sorely; but, though doubting, she was not as yet lost.
"Does it put you in mind of old days?" said Burgo.
She was driven to answer, and she knew that much would be decided by the way in which she might now speak. "You must not talk of that," she said, very softly.