If Lucilla represented an infinite blessing to Canon Morchard, the fact was not over evident at the moment. His brow was thunderous as he gazed at her.
“It is Valeria’s own choice that has sent her into a far country. She might have been at our very gates, had she but willed it so.”
“Well,” said Lucilla reasonably. “I don’t think if Val had been so near us as all that, she would have written and begged one of us to come to her. It’s just because she’s out there, such a long way off, and with no one to help her, that she’s frightened. Why, she may not even be able to get a servant.”
“Poor child!” The Canon’s voice softened. “The way of transgressors is hard. But two wrongs never yet made a right, Lucilla. I recognize the generous impulse that moves you—if I spoke sharply just now, it was only from my intense wish to see you do justice to your own really noble character, my child. Believe me, your duty lies here, in the state to which it has pleased God to call you.”
Lucilla’s brows contracted slightly, after her short-sighted fashion, but it was not at all with an effect of vexation, but rather of some slight perplexity.
At last she said:
“Could Flora go?”
Flora, startled, looked at her father. For a moment it occurred to her that perhaps he would be willing to spare her. Her heart leapt at the thought of seeing Val, and Val’s babies. A vista of new experiences, of hitherto undreamed-of independence, startled even whilst it pleasantly excited her.
Then her father said: “My dear, of what are you thinking? Your zealous desire to befriend one sister makes you strangely inconsiderate of the other. Flora is neither accustomed to responsibility, nor is she very robust in health. Certainly, were it a clear question of duty, one could put all that aside—but the call would have to be unmistakable, the leading beyond all question. I can see no such indications here.”
Flora, quietly bent over her needlework once more, was ashamed of the realization that she was disappointed.