The next instant, cold and collected, he turns the handle of the door, and goes in.
Upon a low seat opposite Mabel Steyne sits Lilian, evidently in the gayest spirits. No shadow of depression, no thought of all the mental agony he has been enduring, mars the brightness of her mignonne face. She is laughing. Her lustrous azure eyes are turned upward to her friend, who is laughing also in apparent appreciation of her guest's jest; her parted lips make merry dimples in her cheeks; her whole face is full of soft lines of amusement.
As Guy comes in, Mabel rises with a little exclamation, and goes toward him with outstretched hands.
"Why, Guy!" she says, "good boy! Have you come for Lilian? I was just going to order the carriage to send her home. Did you walk or drive?"
"I drove." He has studiously since his entrance kept his eyes from Lilian. The smile has faded from her lips, the happy light from her eyes; she has turned a pale, proud little face to the fire, away from her guardian.
"I made Lilian stay to dinner," says Mabel, who is too clever not to have remarked the painful constraint existing between her guest and Sir Guy. "Tom has been out all day shooting and dining at the Bellairs, so I entreated her to stay and bear me company. Won't you sit down for a while? It is early yet; there cannot be any hurry."
"No, thank you. My mother has a bad headache, and, as she does not know where Lilian is, I think it better to get home."
"Oh, if auntie has a headache, of course——"
"I shall go and put on my hat," says Lilian, speaking for the first time, and rising with slow reluctance from her seat. "Don't stir, Mab: I shan't be a minute: my things are all in the next room."