She held up her lovely, tear-stained face, the face that Malcolm had described, the picture of which was locked up in his heart. And Mrs. Keene, speechless, looked and saw and wondered.
And suddenly the golden head was crushed against the childless bosom. "Brownie, Brownie, he doesn't love me, he doesn't love me, and I wish I were dead."
Could this be Beatrix,—this?
XXXVI
Finding that Franklin had left the bedroom that had been allotted to him after washing and changing his clothes,—the others had been flung about the barrack-like room,—Malcolm went downstairs and out to the veranda. Ida Larpent was sitting in front of a tea-table like Patience on a monument, dodging mosquitoes.
"Where's Pelham?" she asked, raising her eyebrows.
"I was going to ask you."
"And Beatrix?"
"In with Mrs. Keene, I think."
Mrs. Larpent heaved a little sigh. "Poor old thing! She'll get well now, and we, I take it, can go our ways in peace. I don't ever want to go through this experience again."