Lance laughed aloud.
"I wonder no longer at your being a bachelor," he said; "if the sight of a beautiful face produces such a strange effect on you. You must deal gently with him, Frances," he said to his wife; "his nerves are weak—he cannot bear much at a time."
"I promise to be very gentle," she said; and the music of that low, caressing voice thrilled my very heart. "I think," she continued, "that Mr. Ford looks very tired, Lance, pale and worn. We must take great care of him."
"That we will," was the hearty reply.
Great Heaven! was it a murderess standing there, with that sweet look of compassion on her beautiful face? Could this woman, who looked pitifully on me, a grown man, drown a little child in the deep sea? Were those lips, littering kindly words of welcome, the same that had cried in mad despair, "Oh, Heaven! if I dare—if I dare?" I could have killed myself for the base suspicion. Yet it was most surely she!
I stooped to pick up the white hawthorn she had dropped. She took it from me with the sweetest smile, and Lance stood by, looking on with an air of proud proprietorship that would have been amusing if it had not been so unutterably pitiful.
While my brain and mind were still chaos—a whirl of thought and emotion—the second dinner-bell rang. I offered her my arm, but I could not refrain from a shudder as her white hand touched it. When I saw that hand last it was most assuredly dropping the little burden into the sea. Lance looked at us most ruefully, so that she laughed and said:
"Come with us, Lance."
She laid her other hand on his arm, and we all three walked into the dining-room together.
I could not eat any dinner—I could only sit and watch the beautiful face. It was the face of a good woman—there was nothing cruel, nothing subtle in it. I must be mistaken. I felt as though I should go mad. She was a perfect hostess—most attentive—most graceful. I shall never forget her kindness to me any more than I shall forget the comeliness of her face or the gleam of her golden hair.