And, for himself, he was not long in recognizing how his impulsiveness had again thrown him at the jump. For, to satisfy his own scruples of high-mindedness, he had submitted his sweet maid to insult and his guests to embarrassment; and there the situation stuck, and a very awkward and unappetizing one it was.
The meal passed to a stiff accompaniment of formalities of both speech and behaviour. Angela assumed, perhaps, a superlative manner of deportment, and she laughed extremely, on a high note, at some very stupid things Dunlone said to her. It would have been all dreadfully prosaic and worldly, had not a touch of tragedy been introduced suddenly from a quite unexpected quarter.
The wine had been placed on the table and the servants were withdrawn, when Tuke was aware that the crazed girl had come into the room and was standing motionless behind his chair. He turned sharply round. Darda, her hands clasped at her back, was gazing at him with an intense look.
“What is it?” he said. “Have you news?”
“Oh! yes,” she answered, nodding her head—“bad news—very, very bad.”
He thought he saw an expression in her eyes that was strange to him, though he fancied himself familiar with most of her moods.
“Tell it me,” he said, hastily rising—to the good fortune of one of the company.
“Don’t you know ’twas I tried to save you?” she asked him in a low voice. “But there was something false—the shadow; it was the shadows that were false. Are you going to throw me away for that? How could I help it? I did my best. You were enchanted, and I walked singing into the castle of the giants to save you; and when I came you were flown. Who tempted you away?”
“Go now, Darda,” he said gently. “I will talk to you by and by.”
“I must know first. They said; but my brain burst like glass, and then I could not remember.”