Lottie tossed aside the magazine and raised herself on her elbow. She had a pretty, ineffectual face and a girlish figure, and, despite her faded colouring, looked almost helplessly young. Her round white hands were as weak as a child's.
"I'm sure I don't know what it can be," she returned. "You look awfully well in that red waist, Eugie. I think I'll get one like it."
Eugenia picked up a child's story book from the rug and laid it on the table; then she stood looking gravely down on the younger woman.
"Can't you guess what it is?" she asked.
Lottie looked up with a nervous blinking of her eyes. She had paled slightly and she leaned over and drew an eiderdown quilt across her knees.
"It—it's not about Bernard?" she asked in a whisper.
"Yes, it is about Bernard. You may go to him and bring him home. You may go to-morrow. Oh, Lottie, doesn't it make you happy?"
Lottie drew the eiderdown quilt still higher. She was not looking at Eugenia, and her mouth had grown sullen. "I don't see why you send me," she said. "Why can't Jack Tucker bring him home? He's with him."
"But I thought you wanted to go," returned Eugenia blankly.
"I haven't seen him for six years," said Lottie, her face still turned away. "He is almost a stranger—and I am afraid of him."