“Mr. Spenser Churchill,” she said, vacantly, then a vague sense of dread fell upon her, and she recalled Jeffrey’s warning.
“Yes, miss; the kindest-hearted gentleman as ever I knew. I’m sure, if he’d been your own father or brother, he couldn’t have done more. Why, he’s seen to everything, you know.”
Doris thrilled with an indefinable alarm and remorse.
“Why—why did you not tell me? Why should he do all this?” she asked.
“Well, miss, because it’s his nature, I suppose,” replied Mrs. Jelf. “You see, he’s what they call a—a philanthropish; always ready to do a kind action, and—lor’, come to that, who wouldn’t be glad to do anything for a sweet young creature like yourself, left so friendless and helpless? There he is now, just coming up the path. Now, you’re not to see him unless you feel strong enough; he can wait, he says——”
“Will you please tell Mr. Churchill that I will see him,” said Doris, and Mrs. Jelf, after another pat or two to the pillow, went out.
Doris tried to brace herself to the coming interview. Her mind had been so clouded that she had not until this moment realized all that this strange gentleman—against whom poor Jeffrey had warned her as her greatest foe—had done for her, and she scarcely knew how to receive him.
The door opened and Spenser Churchill entered. He was dressed in black, and his face was almost seraphic with its expression of reverent sympathy.
“Do not rise, my dear young lady,” he murmured softly. “Mrs. Jelf assured me that you felt equal to seeing me; indeed, wished me to do so, or I should not have intruded upon the sacred solitude of your grief.”
Notwithstanding the honeyed accents, the words seemed to sound artificial to Doris’ acute sense, and she turned her large dark eyes upon him with an unconscious scrutiny.