'Which would enchant me,' said Tom, laughing. 'Anyway'—seriously—'we sign to-night a truce and an alliance.'
'To be sure! though I don't know that I was ever at war with you,' said Mrs. Lyster.
And thereupon they threw themselves into the conversation that was going on around them.
Forgetting her own sorrows, the vivacious little Irishwoman pulled herself together, brought out her best jokes and most amusing stories, and became the life of the party. Lucy followed her lead. Mrs. Durant, the desire of whose heart had been fulfilled, had no difficulty in being lively. They drew out Kit, who made them all laugh with his funny little sayings. Even the mother of little Dick condescended to forget her own dignity and the imminence of the crisis through which she had been brought, and to enjoy herself. But long before it was over, Tom saw, to his distress, that the sudden springing up of vitality which had enabled Grace to take part in the gaiety of the others was over. She lay back on her couch white and still, turning her large blue-grey eyes from one to another as the sallies of wit and merry anecdotes flew by, and smiling now and then vaguely, as though she was making an effort to follow them, but could not quite succeed.
The poor fellow was watching her, as a mother watches a sick child. While he made a feint of listening to the talk at the table, laughing when the others laughed to give himself countenance, and occasionally launching out feebly a witticism of his own, he never lost a single expression of the face that was so unutterably dear to him. Dinner over, he crossed to where she was lying. 'Grace,' he said, in a low voice, under cover of the talk, 'what is it? You are looking worse to-day. Is all this too much for you?'
'No, no,' she answered, with a smile so gentle and patient that it thrilled him to the heart. 'And do you know, I really feel better. You must forgive me for not talking. You know' (pressing her hand to her head) 'there is something here still. It won't let me. I get confused.'
'My darling,' he began passionately, and then checked himself. 'I mustn't be too impulsive yet,' he said under his breath. 'Afterwards, Grace, afterwards——'
'Ah!' she said, with a beautiful indescribable expression. 'Lucy has written. They will know in a very short time that I am here. Perhaps some of them will come. In the meantime—' dreamily.
'In the meantime, talk or be silent, as you please. Do anything! Only get well and strong, Grace. Only get well and strong!'
'I will try,' she said plaintively. 'Sometimes—still—life seems very sweet.'