"This is for you," she said. "I don't know why, but Silva told me to deliver it into your hands, and perhaps when you have read it you will have a different opinion of Vera's mother."
[CHAPTER XLII.]
RUN TO EARTH.
Without waiting for a reply the Countess turned away, and went back into the house again. In the drawing-room Vera was seated, talking earnestly to Lord Ravenspur. There was an awkward pause as the Countess Flavio entered the room. Then Vera rose with a crimson face, and came in the direction of her mother.
"I suppose there is no occasion," she said, "to introduce you to one another, though it is so many years ago--"
"I have never seen Lord Ravenspur before in my life," the Countess said coldly, "and I am quite sure that he has never seen me, either. We are absolute strangers."
"But I thought," Vera stammered, "that Lord Ravenspur and yourself---- Oh, I don't know what I thought."
The girl paused abruptly, conscious that she was saying too much. For some time past she had been hugging what appeared to be a shameful secret to her breast. Her face paled with remorse now when she thought how she had misjudged these two people. But the embarrassment was not all Vera's, for Ravenspur was looking unhappy and uncomfortable. Only the Countess appeared to retain her cold self-possession. For some time no one spoke.
"Sooner or later, I suppose, I shall be entitled to an explanation," the Countess said at length. "It is now eighteen years since I was cruelly deprived of my child. It is just possible that Lord Ravenspur can explain his extraordinary conduct."
"I think I might manage to do that if we were alone," Ravenspur replied. "But, after all, you are Vera's mother, and what I have to say I could not utter in the child's hearing. Oh, I know that sounds like a cowardly remark, but my conscience tells me that I am only doing what is right."