Mrs. Sandworth made her way to the corner where Lydia stood, presenting a faultlessly fitted back to the world so that Madame Boyle might, with a fat, moist forefinger, indicate the spot where a “soupçon” of gold was needed.
“Please, ma’am, the gentleman said I was to wait for an answer,” said the messenger boy beside her.
“And she hasn’t read it, yet!” Madeleine was horrified to remember this fact.
“Turn around, Lydia,” said Mrs. Sandworth.
Lydia’s white lids fluttered. The eyes they revealed were lustrous and quite blank. Madeleine darted away, crying, “I’m going to get pen and paper for you to write your note right now.”
“Lydia,” said Mrs. Sandworth, in a low tone, “Daniel Rankin wants to speak with you again. Your godfather is waiting here in the hall to know if you’ll see him. He didn’t want to force an interview on you if you didn’t want it. He wants to see you but he wanted you to decide in perfect freedom—”
The tragic, troubled, helpless face that Lydia showed at this speech was a commentary on the last word. She looked around the room, her eyebrows drawn into a knot, one hand at her throat, but she did not answer. Her aunt thought she had not understood. “Just collect your thoughts, Lydia—”
The girl beat one slim fist inside the other with a sudden nervous movement. “But that’s what I can’t do, Aunt Julia. You know how easily I get rattled—I don’t know what I’m—I can’t collect my thoughts.”
As the older woman opened her lips to speak again she cut her short with a broken whispered appeal. “No, no; I can’t—see him—? I can’t stand any more—tell him I guess I’ll be all right—it’s settled now—Mother’s told all these—I like Paul. I do like him! Mother’s told everybody here—no, no—I can’t, Aunt Julia! I can’t!”
Mrs. Sandworth, her eyes full of tears, opened her arms impulsively, but Lydia drew back. “Oh, let me alone!” she wailed. “I’m so tired!”