Their toilettes being now completed, they descended to dinner, leaving me quite satisfied that Kitty had no secret grief oppressing her. It must be one of two things, then, I thought, as I watched her going downstairs: either my theory is wrong from beginning to end, or else she as yet knows nothing of this approaching marriage. However, it is very likely that she may not have had time to look at the papers yet, as they had only just come before she went out.
When next I saw her it was very different; and I no longer doubted that I had been right in thinking she cared for Captain Norroy. About an hour after dinner was over I was in her room arranging some clothes, when the door opened, and she entered. Her head was drooping, instead of being carried proudly thrown back as usual; her face was deadly pale, and wore an expression of misery. On seeing her like this, I felt sure that she must have just read the paragraph concerning him, and had rushed off to be alone, so that she might be relieved from the irksome restraint imposed by the presence of other people, and might let her features relax for a while into whatever expression of pain came natural to them.
In taking refuge in her own room she had evidently forgotten the possibility of any one being there; for as soon as she saw me she started violently, and seemed to strive to replace the mask, and look the same as usual for a few moments longer.
"You can leave those things for the present, Jill," she said, controlling her voice with an effort; "I have come to lie down, as I have rather a bad headache."
I saw she longed to have me gone, and as I did not want to add to her troubles, I prepared to take myself off as quickly as possible. But I was bound to play my part of lady's-maid; and as I knew that it would be an unheard-of solecism for such an official not to profess sympathy—whether she really felt it or not—with her mistress' ailments, I was obliged to pause a moment before departing, that I might express concern for her headache, and ask if I should bring her a cup of tea or coffee, or if there was anything else I could do for her. My offer, however, was not accepted.
"All I want is to be left quiet," she said, rather impatiently; "if I want you I will ring."
I withdrew accordingly. She stayed in her room by herself during the remainder of the evening, saying that her headache was still bad. At bedtime she summoned me to assist her as usual, and I thought she looked perfectly wretched. She meant, however, to keep up appearances, for when her aunt came in to inquire how she was, and say good night, she exerted herself to seem as lively as usual. She declared that her headache was all the fault of those stays Jarrot had wanted her to have. The mere idea of such an enormity of tininess had so shocked her nerves, liver, lungs, brain, and organs in general, that they had felt bound to make some forcible demonstration of disgust; and the demonstration had taken the shape of a headache. A night's rest would put her all right, she said, if she did not dream about those horrid stays; but if she were to have a nightmare about wearing them, she really could not say what might be the consequences to her health. This nonsense was uttered with enough of her customary vivacity to deceive Mrs. Rollin, who went away, quite satisfied that there was nothing the matter except an ordinary headache. But I thought differently. I had seen Kitty's lips quivering while she spoke, and had seen unmistakable traces of tears in her eyes; I had felt that her head was burning hot, and the rest of her body like ice; and these things made me believe that there was something more amiss with her than a mere commonplace headache.
When I had performed my duties for the night, and gone to my own room, my heart would keep aching for her, in spite of my efforts to restore it to its habitual condition of sensible hardness. Our recent adventures in Corsica had taught me that she would face death and danger unflinchingly; and I knew her to be exceptionally proud, strong, and brave. Yet for all her strength, courage, and pride, she seemed to be almost broken down to-night. And it naturally moves one more to see such a person as that give way than to witness the upsetting of a weaker mortal.
Anxiety about her, as I pictured to myself her solitary suffering, and longed to be able to comfort her, kept me awake and restless. What if she were to have a brain fever, or a nervous fever, or some other kind of illness such as I had heard of being brought on by a sudden mental shock? Perhaps at that very moment she was ill, and in need of assistance. So uneasy did I become, that at last I could stay away from her no longer, but determined to relieve my mind by going at once to assure myself of her well-being.
I got up accordingly, put on a dressing-gown, and stole quietly to the door of her room, where I stood listening for a minute, and wondering whether she had had the good fortune to fall asleep. No; for I heard a deep sigh, followed by an inarticulate, moaning sound, which—though so low as to be hardly audible—had something about it that seemed to me unutterably sad and forlorn. An incontrollable impulse seized me to go to her and try if I could not find some way of being of use or comfort to her. But I could not enter the room unless she choose to admit me, for she always kept her door locked at night when in a hotel. I knocked gently, and she responded, "Qui est-ce?"