The maid had carried away the tea-things, Neville had gone into the inner room to fetch some papers, and Theresa stood looking into the fire with one foot on the fender, one hand on the mantelpiece and the other hanging at her side. The room was in darkness but for one rosy light and the flames of the fire, and in this brilliance she stood enshrined.
The door opened, she slowly turned her head, and her hand dropped from the mantelpiece in the excess of her trembling. A tall, dark man, wrapped in a great coat, stood by the door, and for an instant she had thought she looked at Alexander; the next, Mr. Smith had bustled in, exclaimed at the darkness, turned on another light, and presented his nephew to Theresa.
Mr. Basil Morton made a deep bow in response to her exquisite little inclination, and she had an impression of a handsome, serious face emerging from the upturned collar of his coat.
"Bitter night," said Simon Smith. "I'll drive you home, Miss Webb. Much too cold for you to walk, and you never have thick boots. You shall have the brougham. We had the dog-cart. B-rrrh!" He rang the bell, and tried to shake himself into warmth.
"Please don't order the carriage." She was vividly aware of Mr. Morton's continued gaze. "I can't go home for hours."
"Why not? What's Neville thinking of? Jack! You two know each other, don't you?"
Neville shook hands heartily with the Landed Proprietor. "Cold drive?"
"Very." He turned to Theresa. "But your streets are beautiful at night."
"The docks are best," she said, and as a siren called through the darkness, she waved a hand towards the window. "It's full tide."
"We didn't pass the docks," he said.