There was a hot red spot in his cheeks as he spoke in a curiously excited way, and Gertrude felt a strange sense of shrinking as he hastily snatched away her jacket, threw it on a chair, and clasped her in his arms.
“John,” she cried, struggling to free herself, “look! look!”
He loosed his grasp and turned suddenly upon a figure which stood right in the doorway, that of a tall handsome woman, looking ghastly pale, and her great eyes dilated with rage and surprise. She had evidently risen from a sick couch, and wore a long loose white dressing-gown, which, with her long dark hair flowing over her shoulders, gave her an almost supernatural look, heightened by the silence in which she gazed from one to another.
“What are you doing here?” cried Huish sharply. “I thought you were in bed—ill.”
“I was,” replied the woman slowly, “till I heard you return.”
“Go back to it then,” he said brutally; “why do you come here?”
Gertrude shrank back towards the couch, as the woman slowly entered, with her eyes fixed fiercely upon her, and the door swung to.
“Who is this?” she cried, in a low angry voice.
“Take no notice of her. I will get her away,” whispered Huish, crossing to Gertrude’s side. “She is mad!”
“No, girl, I am not mad,” said the woman sternly; for her hearing seemed to have been sharpened by her illness, and she had heard every word. “John Huish,” she said sternly, “answer me—who is this?”