Her face was set now, her lips closed tight; but she nodded.
"You have no word to send, I suppose?—No, of course not: how could you? Then if he asks, or if it is necessary to tell him about you, as of course it will be, I am to say merely what I think, so that you are nowise responsible?—Yes, I see. But the main thing to do there is to make observations, and bring my report to you?—Certainly: he must put himself on record before you do, if this is to go on. If? Of course it will: it shall be all right, my dear child. Then it follows that I can't bring him back with me?—Why no: he must bide his time, and fulfil his penance. That is all, I believe: the examination—or the operation, I had nearly said—is over, and you have borne it well. Thank you, Princess; and forgive me for troubling you. You won't hate me, will you, for having to be so horrid, and making you go through all this?—Thank you again. Shall we turn homeward now?—Yes, we'll be there by dark."
She sat very still, and paler than I like to see her. As for me, great beads of perspiration were on my forehead, though it was a cool day. I drove as fast now as the law allows. At last she spoke, and her voice trembled. "Brother, how shockingly we have all misjudged you!"
"No, dear: you did not misjudge me at all. But you have been educating me, and it is fit the best there is in me should come to the front for your service—if it never put its head up before, nor should again. Wait till I come back: I've done nothing yet."
"You have done everything. The rest will be easy for you, compared with this."
"By Jove, you are right there: I'm glad we're through this part of it.—One thing more; about Jane. She loves you as I do; she has been berating me for indifference and slackness in the cause. O, she is a trump: she was crying bitterly last night because she could do nothing to help you, and because I was too lazy and cowardly to move; she has egged me on to this. May I tell her what we have agreed on?"
"O yes, tell her anything you like, and Mabel too. I have made you all such a poor return: any other woman in my place would have trusted you long ago, and been the better for it. But I am so strangely made, Robert: my lips are like a seal to my heart. Excuse me at dinner, won't you? And promise me one thing—that always, after this, you will come to me at once, without scruple, when you want me, on my account or on your own. As if I could be reluctant to talk with you! Tell me when you hear from him, and when you are going, and—anything else. You won't mind my silence, or wait for me to speak? And you must never be afraid of me again."