"I have already remained so much longer than I intended, that I am afraid to say. My plans are now uncertain."
"Excuse me—I know I presume—but in our profession we must venture a little now and then—could you not have some friend with you until you are perfectly strong again? After what you have come through, it may be years before you are quite what you were. I don't want to frighten you—only to make you careful."
"There is no one," she answered in a low voice, which trembled a little.
"No one—?" repeated Faber, as if waiting for the end of the sentence.
But his heart gave a great bound.
"No one to come to me. I am alone in the world. My mother died when I was a child and my father two years ago. He was an officer. I was his only child, and used to go about with him. I have no friends."
Her voice faltered more and more. When it ceased she seemed choking a cry.
"Since then," she resumed, "I have been a governess. My last situation was in Yorkshire, in a cold part of the county, and my health began to fail me. I heard that Glaston was a warm place, and one where I should be likely to get employment. But I was taken ill on my way there, and forced to stop. A lady in the train told me this was such a sweet, quiet little place, and so when we got to the station I came on here."
Again Faber could not speak. The thought of a lady like her traveling about alone looking for work was frightful! "And they talk of a God in the world!" he said to himself—and felt as if he never could forgive Him.
"I have papers to show," she added quietly, as if bethinking herself that he might be taking her for an impostor.
All the time she had never looked him in the face. She had fixed her gaze on the far horizon, but a smile, half pitiful, half proud, flickered about the wonderful curves of her upper lip.