"Welcome out of your room, sir," said the judge. "I compliment you, and Pottinger also, upon your quick recovery; but allow me to tell you that you don't yet look a man fit to rough it alone in London."
"I feel very well, sir," said Graham.
And then Mrs. Arbuthnot greeted him, and Miss Furnival, and four or five others who were of the party, and he was introduced to one or two whom he had not seen before. Marian too came up to him,—very gently, as though he were as brittle as glass, having been warned by her mother. "Oh, Mr. Felix," she said, "I was so unhappy when your bones were broken. I do hope they won't break again."
And then he perceived that Madeline was in the room and was coming up to him. She had in truth not been there when he first entered, having thought it better, as a matter of strategy, to follow upon his footsteps. He was getting up to meet her, when Lady Staveley spoke to him.
"Don't move, Mr. Graham. Invalids, you know, are chartered."
"I am very glad to see you once more down stairs," said Madeline, as she frankly gave him her hand,—not merely touching his—"very, very glad. But I do hope you will get stronger before you venture to leave Noningsby. You have frightened us all very much by your terrible accident."
All this was said in her peculiarly sweet silver voice, not speaking as though she were dismayed and beside herself, or in a hurry to get through a lesson which she had taught herself. She had her secret to hide, and had schooled herself how to hide it. But in so schooling herself she had been compelled to acknowledge to herself that the secret did exist. She had told herself that she must meet him, and that in meeting him she must hide it. This she had done with absolute success. Such is the peculiar power of women; and her mother, who had listened not only to every word, but to every tone of her voice, gave her exceeding credit.
"There's more in her than I thought there was," said Sophia Furnival to herself, who had also listened and watched.
"It has not gone very deep, with her," said the judge, who on this matter was not so good a judge as Miss Furnival.
"She cares about me just as Mrs. Baker does," said Graham to himself, who was the worst judge of them all. He muttered something quite unintelligible in answer to the kindness of her words; and then Madeline, having gone through her task, retired to the further side of the round table, and went to work among the teacups.