A woman made up of mild virtues—good, though not religious; kind and pleasant, though not benevolent, abhorring the poor, and the sick, and the unfortunate—the very name of trouble was disagreeable to her. This world would have been a sunny, rose-tinted Arcadia could she have had her way; it should have been always summer.
She went regularly to church on Sunday morning with great decorum, turning over the pages of her beautiful ivory-covered church service at the proper time, and always put sovereigns on the plate with much liberality when there was a collection. She gave directions to her housekeeper in the country to deal out coats, and blankets, and all that sort of thing, to deserving applicants. If flower-girls, or wretched-looking beggars, crowded round her carriage when she went out shopping, they not unfrequently received sixpences as a bribe to take themselves and their miseries out of sight.
So that, altogether, her ladyship felt she had a reason to rely on being defended from all adversities which might happen to the body, and all evil thoughts which might assault and hurt the soul.
Lady Quaintree was nearly asleep when a liveried servant drew aside the velvet portière, and announced:
“Captain Desfrayne and Mr. Amberley!”
Paul Desfrayne’s glance swept the suite of apartments, as if in search of the girl who unconsciously held the threads of his destiny in her hands; but, to his relief, she was not to be seen.
He allowed himself to be led up to the mistress of the house, and went through the ceremony of introduction like one in a dream. Lady Quaintree spoke to him, and made some smiling remarks; but he was unable to do more than reply intelligibly in monosyllables. The first words that broke upon his half-dazed senses with anything like clearness were uttered by Frank Amberley.
“Not so much, my dear aunt, to pay our respects to you as to communicate a most important matter of business to—to Miss Turquand. I suppose we ought to have come at a proper hour in the business part of the day, but it was my idea to, if possible, take off the—in fact, I imagined it might be the most pleasant way of introducing Captain Desfrayne to bring him here this evening.”
Lady Quaintree had opened her eyes at the commencement of this speech.
“A most important matter of business concerning Miss Turquand?” she said. “What can it possibly be?”