"Yes, dear?"
"This letter"—touching it—"is from my cousin."
"Yes,—from your cousin? The lad who grew up with you at the Park?" says Lady Chetwoode, with a kindly nod of comprehension.
Then ensues a pause. Somehow every one has stopped talking, and Lady Chetwoode has set down the teapot and turned to Lilian with an air full of expectancy. They all feel that something yet remains to be said.
Possessed with this idea, and seeing Lilian's hesitation, Lady Chetwoode says, in her gentlest tones:
"Well, dear?"
"He is unhappy," says Lilian, running one of her fingers up and down the table-cloth and growing more and more embarrassed: "every year he used to come to the Park for his holidays, and now——"
"And now he cannot go to the Park: is that it?"
"Yes. A little while ago he joined his regiment, and now he has leave of absence, and he has nowhere to spend it except at Colonel Graham's, who is his guardian and his uncle, and he hates Colonel Graham," says Lilian, impressively, looking at Lady Chetwoode with appealing eyes.
"Poor boy," says that kindest of women, "I do not like to hear of his being unhappy. Perhaps, Lilian, you would wish——"