“Happy—happy?” she said, interrogatively.
“Happy in the prospect of happiness,” said he. “I suppose that is the simplest way of putting the matter.”
She was silent for a long time, until she came to perceive that the silence meant far more than she intended. That was why she cried rather quickly:
“You have seen him—Claude—you have conversed with him?”
“Yes. He came to see me yesterday,” replied Sir Percival. “Great heavens! What that man has gone through. He deserves his happiness—the greatest happiness that any man dare hope for.”
“Ah, I meant that he should be so happy,” she cried, and there was something piteous in her tone.
“And you will make him happy,” said her companion. “When a woman makes up her mind on this particular point, a man cannot help himself. His most strenuous efforts in the other direction count for nothing. He will be made happy in spite of himself.”
She turned her eyes upon him inquiringly.
“You heard him speak—you heard the way he talks on that terrible matter?”
“Yes; that was how it came about that he visited me. He wanted me to tell him all that I knew on the subject—he was anxious to have the scene in the Assize Court described to him by some new voice. He wished to know if I signed a petition for the reprieve of the murderer, and when I told him no petition had been signed, but that the Home Secretary had reprieved the man after, I supposed, consultation with the judge who tried the case, and with the law officers for the Crown, he seemed to be overcome with astonishment and indignation.”