Poor Mrs. Abercarne, therefore, soon began to find herself in a very awkward position between her employer on the one hand, eagerly anxious to see the girl, or even to minister to her pleasure, unseen, in any way that might be suggested; and her daughter on the other, who had conceived such a strong aversion for the man that she would not even look at the books and papers her mother brought her, because she knew that they were supplied by him. Her dislike, indeed, to the very sound of his name was becoming almost a mania, so that Mrs. Abercarne feared she would have to leave Wyngham on account of it.
It need scarcely be said that Mrs. Abercarne, who had been completely won by John Bradfield’s passion for her daughter, not only acquitted him of the crime her daughter chose to suggest in the matter of the fire, but looked upon the disappearance of the lunatic, either by suicide or by misadventure, as a very fortunate circumstance.
CHAPTER XXX. MR. MARRABLE AGAIN.
The doctor was troubled by the slowness of the girl’s convalescence, and by her own lack of a strong desire to get well again. He recommended change for one thing, and cheerful society. Now the one was as difficult to get as the other. Change could only be got by sacrificing a situation to the disadvantages of which Mrs. Abercarne had grown accustomed, while its advantages she appreciated more every day. Cheerful society seemed more out of the question still.
It was therefore with a feeling almost of gratitude that Mrs. Abercarne, while sitting by her daughter’s sofa one morning, heard that Miss Lilith Graham-Shute was downstairs, and that she wanted to know if she could see Miss Abercarne.
“Show her up, Corbett,” said Mrs. Abercarne. And turning to Chris, she said: “You would like to see her, my dear, wouldn’t you?”
“Yes,” said Chris.
The two girls, indeed, had felt a mutual attraction, and had only been prevented by the fierce enmity which raged between their respective mothers from becoming very good friends indeed.
When Lilith came in, smiling, bright-eyed, cheery, and suffering from a valiant attempt to subdue her usual exuberance of voice and manner, her entrance was like a ray of sunshine. She came to the side of the sofa on tip-toe, which was quite unnecessary, and caused her to be so unsteady of gait that she knocked over a basket of flowers which had been placed on a little stand beside the sofa.