Mrs. Stothard heard the sound, but seemed in no way greatly influenced thereby; she looked up very calmly, saying to herself, "I suppose some climax has arrived; the departure of this young man was sure to bring it about. She has been fidgety lately, I have noticed, at the constant attention Mr. Wainwright has paid to Annette, and at the evident delight with which the girl has received the attentions. That bids fair to go exactly as I could have wished it. But there is some hitch in the other arrangement, I fear, from the little I could overhear of what he said to his friend the other day about Fanny; it must have been about Fanny, although he called her by some other name which I couldn't catch. He seemed nervously anxious about her, and appears to think that his absence from town has weakened her affection for him. That ought not to be, and that is not at all like Fanny's tactics; though there is something wrong, I fear, for I have not heard from her for some time, and her last letter was scarcely satisfactory. Yes, yes," she added impatiently, as the bell sounded again, "I am coming. It seems impossible for you, Mrs. Derinzy, to bear the burden of your trouble alone, even for five minutes."
When she entered the room, she found Mrs. Derinzy lying on the sofa with her head buried in the pillow; she was moaning and sobbing hysterically, and rocking her body to and fro.
"Are you ill?" asked Mrs. Stothard, calmly, as she took up her position at the end of the sofa, and surveyed her mistress without any apparent emotion.
"Yes, very ill, very ill indeed--half broken and crushed," cried Mrs. Derinzy. "It is too hard, Martha, it is too hard to have to go through what I have suffered, and to have all one's hopes blighted by the wilfulness of one for whom I have toiled and slaved so hard and so long."
"You mean Mr. Paul," said Mrs. Stothard. "I suppose that, notwithstanding my strong advice to the contrary, you have persisted in your determination, and asked him, before leaving to return to London, to give his answer about your project?"
"Yes," sobbed Mrs. Derinzy, "I have. I had him in here just now, and I went over it all again. I told him how, when I first heard of that ridiculous will which his uncle Paul had made, I determined that the fortune which ought to have been left to my boy, should become his somehow or other; how I had decided upon the marriage with Annette; how for all these years I had worked to compass it and bring it about: and how, now the time had arrived when the marriage ought to take place----"
"You didn't tell him anything about Annette's illness?" asked Mrs. Stothard, interrupting.
"Of course not, Martha," said Mrs. Derinzy, raising her head and looking angrily at the nurse; "how could you ask such a ridiculous question?"
"It is no matter, he will know it soon enough," said Mrs. Stothard, quietly. "Well, he refused?"
"He did," said Mrs. Derinzy, again bursting into tears, "like a wicked and ungrateful boy as he is; he refused decidedly."