'Oh, can you bear this, Thyrza?'
The other smiled, made a motion with her hand, and went out with a quick step.
The parlour door—entrance so familiar to her—was half open. She entered, and closed it. Gilbert came forward. His face was not at all what she had feared; he smiled pleasantly, and offered his hand.
'So you have come to see me as well as Lydia. It is kind of you.'
The words might have borne a very different meaning from that which his voice and look gave them. He spoke with perfect simplicity, as though no painful thought could be excited by the meeting. Thyrza saw, in the instant for which her eyes read his countenance, that he did not often smile thus. He was noticeably an older man than when she abandoned him; his beard was partly grizzled, his eyes were yet more sunken. There was some change, too, in his voice; its sound did not recall the past quite as she had expected.
But the change in her was so great that he could not move his eyes from her. When she looked up again, he still seemed to be endeavouring to recognise her.
'I didn't know whether you would see me,' she said with hurried breath.
'I am very, very glad to see you.'
He seemed about to ask her to sit down. His eyes fell on the chair which was always called hers. Thyrza noticed it at the same time. From it she looked to him. Gilbert averted his eyes.
'I did not come to see Lyddy,' Thyrza said, forcing her voice to steadiness. 'It was to speak to you. I didn't dare to hope you would be so——'