“Sit down there, and listen to me,” she said, with a pretty little air of authority. Then she drew an ottoman to his side and sunk down upon it, and leaned her arms upon his knees, and lifted her beautiful dark face, now all aglow with the delight of benevolence, and told him all that had passed in the interview between herself and Mrs. Blondelle.
And Lyon Berners, with his arm over her graceful shoulders, his fingers stringing her silken black ringlets, and his eyes gazing with infinite tenderness and admiration down on her eloquent face, listened with attentive interest to the story. But at its close, great was his astonishment.
“My dear, impulsive Sybil, what have you done!” he exclaimed.
“What!” echoed Sybil, her crimson lips breathlessly apart—her dark eyes dilated.
“Love, you have invited a perfect stranger, casually met at a hotel—a gambler’s wife, even by her own showing, an adventuress by all other appearances, to come and take up her abode with us for an indefinite length of time!”
Sybil’s mouth opened, and her eyes dilated with an almost comical expression of dismay. She had not a word to say in self-defence!
“Do not think I blame you, dear, warm, imprudent heart! I only wonder at you, and—adore you!” he said, earnestly pressing her to his bosom.
“Oh, but you would have done as I did, if you had seen her distress!” pleaded Sybil, recovering her powers of speech.
“But could you not have helped her without inviting her home with us?”
“But how?” inquired Sybil.