The elderly face brightened.
'Do you mean to say that—that there is any hope?' she asked eagerly.
Margaret laughed now, but in a gentle and affectionate sort of way.
'Perhaps, just a little! But don't ask me, please. I've come home—this is always home for me, isn't it?—I've come home to forget everything for a few weeks.'
'Thank heaven!' ejaculated Mrs. Rushmore in a tone of deep relief. 'Then if—if he should call this afternoon, or even to-morrow—may I tell them to say that you are out?'
She was losing no time; and Margaret laughed again, though she put her head a little on one side with an expression of doubt.
'I can't refuse to see him,' she said, 'though really I would much rather be alone with you for a day or two.' [{74}]
'My darling child!' cried Mrs. Rushmore, applying another embrace, 'you shall! Leave it to me!'
Mrs. Rushmore's delight was touching, for she could almost feel that Margaret had come to see her quite for her own sake, whereas she had pictured the 'child,' as she still called the great artist, spending most of her time in carrying on inaudible conversations with Logotheti under the trees in the lawn, or in the most remote corners of the drawing-room; for that had been the accepted method of courtship in Mrs. Rushmore's young days, and she was quite ignorant of the changes that had taken place since then.
Half-an-hour later, Margaret was in her old room upstairs writing a letter, and Mrs. Rushmore had given strict orders that until further notice Miss Donne was 'not at home' for any one at all, no matter who might call.