There was silence after this, and Francie wondered what had made Charlotte suddenly get so cross for nothing; she had been so good-natured for the last week. The thought passed through her mind that possibly Mr. Lambert had taken as little notice of Charlotte as of the wreath; she was just sufficiently aware of the state of affairs to know that such a cause might have such an effect, and she wished she had tried any other topic of conversation. Darning is, however, an occupation that does not tend to unloose the strings of the tongue, and even when carried out according to the unexacting methods of Macadam, it demands a certain degree of concentration, and Francie left to Charlotte the task of finding a more congenial subject. It was chosen with unexpected directness.
“What was the matter with you yesterday afternoon when Louisa brought in the tea?”
Francie felt as though a pistol had been let off at her ear; the blood surged in a great wave from her heart to her head, her heart gave a shattering thump against her side, and then went on beating again in a way that made her hands shake.
“Yesterday afternoon, Charlotte?” she said, while her brain sought madly for a means of escape and found none; “there—there was nothing the matter with me.”
“Look here now, Francie;” Charlotte turned away from her davenport, and faced her cousin with her fists clenched on her knees; “I’m in loco parentis to you for the time being—your guardian, if you understand that better—and there’s no good in your beating about the bush with me. What happened between you and Christopher Dysart yesterday afternoon?”
“Nothing happened at all,” said Francie in a low voice that gave the lie to her words.
“You’re telling me a falsehood! How have you the face to tell me there was nothing happened when even that fool Louisa could see that something had been going on to make you cry, and to send him packing out of the house not a quarter of an hour after he came into it!”
“I told you before he couldn’t wait,” said Francie, trying to keep the tremble out of her voice. She held the conventional belief that Charlotte was queer, but very kind and jolly, but she had a fear of her that she could hardly have given a reason for. It must have been by that measuring and crossing of weapons that takes place unwittingly and yet surely in the consciousness of everyone who lives in intimate connection with another, that she had learned, like her great-aunt before her, the weight of the real Charlotte’s will, and the terror of her personality.
“Stuff and nonsense!” broke out Miss Mullen, her eyes beginning to sparkle ominously; “thank God I’m not such an ass as the people you’ve taken in before now; ye’ll not find it so easy to make a fool of me as ye think! Did he make ye an offer or did he not?” She leaned forward with her mouth half open, and Francie felt her breath strike on her face, and shrank back.
“He—he did not.”