It was not many minutes before Lady Montfort rejoined him.
"You touched unawares," said she, "upon the poor child's most anxious cause of sorrow. Her grandfather; for whom her affection is so sensitively keen, has disappeared. I will speak of that later; and if you wish, you shall be taken into our consultations. But—" she paused, looked into his face-open, loyal face, face of gentleman—with heart of man in its eyes, soul of man on its brow; face formed to look up to the stars which now lighted it—and laying her hand lightly on his shoulder, resumed with hesitating voice: "but I feel like a culprit in asking you what, nevertheless, I must ask, as an imperative condition, if your visits here are to be renewed—if your intimacy here is to be established. And unless you comply with that condition, come no more; we cannot confide in each other."
"Oh, Lady Montfort, impose any condition. I promise beforehand."
"Not beforehand. The condition is this: inviolable secrecy. You will not mention to any one your visits here; your introduction to me; your discovery of the stroller's grandchild in my adopted daughter."
"Not to Mr. Darrell?"
"To him least of all; but this I add, it is for Mr. Darrell's sake that I insist on such concealment; and I trust the concealment will not be long protracted."
"For Mr. Darrell's sake?"
"For the sake of his happiness," cried Lady Montfort, clasping her hands.
"My debt to him is larger far than yours; and in thus appealing to you,
I scheme to pay back a part of it. Do you trust me?"
"I do, I do."
And from that evening Lionel Haughton became the constant visitor in that house.