“Judging from his face,” she observed, “I should say that he had asked her to marry him, and had been accepted. Judging from hers, I should say her answer had been ‘No.’ You are not easy to read, for once, Georgie. What does it mean?”
Georgie came into the house, with a more composed look than her face had worn for several days. She laid her garden hat upon the hall table and walked straight into the parlor to her dear Lisbeth. She had a very shrewd idea that her dear Lisbeth knew nothing of their guest’s intended departure, and she wanted to be the first to break the news to her. It would not matter if any little secrets were betrayed to herself. So she went to the window, and laid her hand on Lisbeth’s shoulder.
“Did Hector tell you that he was going?” she asked, as if his having done so would have been the most natural thing in the world.
“That he was going?” repeated Lisbeth.
Georgie gazed considerately out into the garden.
“Yes. Back to London, you know—to-morrow. I suppose he thinks he has been idle long enough.”
Lisbeth shrugged her shoulders.
“Rather sudden, isn’t it?” she commented. “I think you have been the first to hear the news.”
“Gentlemen always do things suddenly,” remarked Georgie, astutely.
She had no need to have been so discreet. Lisbeth had been very cool under the information. An indifferent observer might have easily concluded that she cared very little about it; that her interest in Hector Anstruthers’ going and coming was an extremely well-controlled feeling. When he came into the room himself, a few minutes later, she was quite composed enough to touch upon the subject with polite regrets.