“Why—why, don't cry, dearest! Don't!” he whispered miserably. “What a rotter I am! Inflicting you with my silly imaginings! Don't cry! I dare say everything will turn out all right. It's my beastly disposition. Kiss me!”
She kissed him swiftly. Her wet cheek lay for a second against his own, and then, with a stifled good night, she broke away from him. An instant later she was gone; her door was closed.
Somewhat sobered, and not a little perturbed by her outburst, he stood still for a moment, staring at the door. Then he turned and passed slowly into his own room.
A fire smouldered in the grate. In this huge, old-fashioned house there were grates in all of the spacious bedrooms, and not infrequently fires were started in them by the capable Jones. Frederic stood for he knew not how long above the half-dead coals, staring at them with a new and more bitter complaint at the back of his mind. Was there anything between Mrs Desmond and his father? What was back of that look of anguish in Lydia's eyes? He suddenly realised that he was muttering oaths, not of anger, but of pain.
The next morning he came down earlier than was his custom. His night had been a troubled one. Forgetting his own woes, or belittling them, he had thought only of what this news from the sea would mean to the dear woman he loved so well. No one was in the library, but a huge fire was blazing. A blizzard was raging.
Once upon a time, when he first came to the house, a piano had stood in the drawing-room. His joy at that time knew no bounds; he loved music. For his age he was no mean musician. But one evening his father, coming in unexpectedly, heard the player at the instrument. For a moment he stood transfixed in the doorway watching the eager, almost inspired face of the lad, and then, pale as a ghost, stole away without disturbing him. Strange to say, Frederic was playing a waltz of Ziehrer's, a Waltz that his mother had played when the honeymoon was in the full. The following day the piano was taken away by a storage company. The boy never knew why it was removed.
Frederic picked up the morning paper. His eye traversed the front page rapidly. There were reports of fearful weather at sea. Ships in touch with wireless stations flashed news of the riotous gales far out on the Atlantic, of tremendous seas that wreaked damage to the staunchest of vessels. The whole seaboard was strewn with the wreckage of small craft; a score of vessels were known to be ashore and in grave peril. The movement of passenger-vessels, at the bottom of the page, riveted his attention. The Lusitania was reported seven hundred miles out, and in the heart of the hurricane. She would be a day late.
The newspaper was slightly crumpled, as if someone else had read it before him. He found himself wondering how he would feel if the Lusitania never reached New York! He wondered what his sensations would be if a call for help came from the great vessel, if the dreadful news came that she was sinking with all on board!
He looked up from the paper with what actually seemed to him to be a guilty feeling. Someone had entered the room. Mrs Desmond was coming toward him, a queer little smile on her lips. She was a tall, fair woman, an English type, and still extremely handsome. Hers was an honest beauty that had no fear of age.
“She is a staunch ship, Frederic,” she said, without any other form of greeting. “She will be late, but there's really nothing to worry about.”