“You are too sharp for me. You know very well I did not mean that. You are a charming woman who can hold your own in any society; you have caused quite a flutter among us poor rustics; and Harry, finding himself the possessor of something everybody else admires, with dog-in-the-manger instincts, wishes to keep all to himself the treasure whose value he himself would never have discovered and is quite unable to appreciate.”
“You are too severe upon poor Harry. He has a lot of good qualities—you know I always said so; only—unfortunately they are qualities which don’t harmonize very well with mine.”
“Nor with anybody else’s. It is unfortunate, certainly. He would be charming on a desert island.”
“I really think he would be happier there,” said Annie, with a sigh, “if he had a horse and some dogs. He is kind to animals, and they seem to understand him. Good-night, George; I must go to him now. And the chances are even whether he will try to hit me if I go near him, or insist on my remaining in the room till he goes to sleep.”
She shook hands, and left the baronet gazing admiringly at her little figure, as she disappeared swiftly and silently down the corridor toward the room her husband occupied. She tapped at the door; but, getting no answer and hearing no sound, she opened it and went in. Harry was lying on the bed in his dressing-gown, and her first thought was that he was not sober. But when she opened the door to Mrs. Stanley a minute after, and saw that that dignified lady held a spirit-decanter in her hand, she whispered:
“Take that away, please. He has gone to sleep, I think.”
“That is all right. I was as long as I could be, and I brought it myself, in hopes that you would be here when I came back.”
The housekeeper went away, and Annie, fearful he might take cold, drew a rug softly over her sleeping husband. The touch roused him; he turned over toward her, and, just half opening his eyes, threw his right arm round her neck as she was bending down, and instantly dozed off again, tired out. The action moved Annie, and she knelt down beside the bed, careful not to disturb him by displacing the arm that held her in an unconscious caress until his next movement, when she woke him up, told him to go to bed, and left him before he had time to remember his anger against her and spoil the effect of that half-unconscious embrace.
But the next morning he was in a gentle mood, and did not allude to her distasteful career when she brought him his breakfast. This good-humor lasted until he went down-stairs, and, after looking in the various rooms, found his wife in the library with William, having tracked them by their voices and laughter.
William, with great tact, instantly assumed an appearance of preternatural solemnity on his brother’s entrance.