"I can't afford to rest," she said; "if I did not go on working I should lose my reason. And I do hate London so. Still, I have a mother more or less dependent upon me, and for her sake I have to go on. If I could manage to get into the country for a few weeks I think I could regain strength. Connie is an angel of goodness, but I can't let her do my work for me much longer."
"That's sinful pride," Connie said with something between a laugh and a sob. "What vexes her is that her substitute is so poor a workman. Still, there is a deal in what Grace says, and if she could be in the country, not too far away from London, where----"
Lady Dashwood glanced up and met Mary's pleading eyes. She understood exactly what the girl meant without asking a single question. She crossed over to the couch and took Grace's thin white hand tenderly in her own.
"There is nothing easier," she said, "let me be the fairy godmother. I am a very lonely old woman, since Mary made up her mind that she would go out into the world and earn her own living. I was very sad about it at the time, but I am not so sad now. Because the day is coming when Mary will return to her old home, and be happier by far than she has ever been before. Still, I am very lonely now, and I should welcome some bright young face to gladden the whole home and make life more tolerable to me. The dower house is a grand old place, and any artist would soon fall in love with it. Bring your work down there, Gracie, come and live in the open air and forget your anxiety for the future. When I looked at Mary just now, her eyes asked me to do this thing. But I am not doing it to please Mary so much as to please myself. It is very selfish of me. I know----"
"Selfish!" Grace cried, "I could love you for what you say. The mere thought of it makes my heart beat all the faster. But for the sake of others----"
"Never mind the others," Connie cried, "go away and get well. I dare not think what I should do if I had the same opportunity. Go away and do your own work. How can you have the face to stay here and allow me to do your drawings for you? It is the most selfish thing I ever heard of in my life, and I decline to put up with it any longer. . . . Oh, my dear, it is the very thing that I have been praying for. Don't hesitate, Grace--think of your mother, of the grand future. If I loved you less than I do----"
The smile faded from Connie's face, she had hard work to keep back the tears. Lady Dashwood's smile, too, was watery and unsteady. She was glad to find that Mary had fallen in with companions like these. She could understand now why the girl had softened and improved. Hitherto she had regarded Mary as perfect, but this was a chastened and purified Mary of whom she had never dreamed. She could see the working of Grace's mind in her face.
"You are very good to me," the girl said slowly, "everybody is good to me. I never knew how much goodness there was in the world till my health began to fail. It made me hard and bitter to see those frivolous society people roll by in their carriages, and think that the money they wasted on one abandoned toy would have sufficed to give me back the strength I needed. Mary knows what I mean."
"I do, indeed," Mary said with a flush on her face, "but I had to pay for my knowledge of my selfish folly by the loss of everything that I held most dear. And now that I have learned my lesson, I have nothing to put it into practice with. Still, the point does not refer to Lady Dashwood, who is quite sincere in what she says. If you hesitate any longer, Grace, I shall regard myself as a murderess. You will not carry your pride so far as to endanger your life."
"No, no," Grace cried, "you are all right and I am wrong. I know perfectly well that if I stay here like this I shall die. Therefore, with the deepest gratitude, I have decided to accept Lady Dashwood's offer. Oh, if you only knew how I long for the sight of a green tree----"