She rang the bell and ordered dinner to be laid for Mr. Eyrle. Then they went out with the children until it should be ready.
He remembers, and will so remember until he dies, the pretty scene—the fair, young children among the flowers. When they were tired, baby Maude came to her mother, who raised her in her arms and laid the golden head on her gentle breast. Harry climbed the seat, and clasped his arms around his mother’s neck. The sun shone on her fair, stately head, with its coronal of fair hair, on her sweet, tender face, on the blue dress and white lace.
“You form quite a picture,” said Kenelm, with a smile. “I should like to make a sketch of you, Lady Alden, just as you sit. I would send it to Ronald.”
She made no reply, and, looking at her, he saw that she was very pale and had tears in her eyes.
“Lady Alden,” he said, “you are surely not grieving over the business affair of Gaspin’s?”
“No,” she replied; “but I am not myself to-day. I have a dreadful nervous depression that I cannot shake off.”
“Have you been overtiring yourself?” he asked.
“No; I have had such unpleasant dreams of Ronald—all of Ronald. I dreamed last night that I saw him, but could not reach him because of a deep, black stream that flowed between us; and as I looked the stream deepened and darkened, while he cried out to me that we were parted, and he should never see me again.”
“But you do not believe in dreams?” he said, cheerfully.
“No, I do not believe in them; but this one has haunted me, and has made me nervous and sad all day long.”