Alleyne started, coloured, and then drew back, with the major watching him intently, while Rolph laid his hand playfully upon Glynne’s forehead, and slipped it before her eyes.
“Now then, have you found the focus. What is it? A penny a peep? Here, Mr Alleyne, do you take the money?”
A dead silence fell upon the group till the major hastened to break it by saying a few words of praise of the place to Mrs Alleyne.
Soon afterwards they went back to the drawing-room and partook of tea, the carriage arriving directly after, and everyone thinking it time to leave, for a curious chill had come over the party, Glynne having subsided into her old, silent, inanimate way, and no effort of the major or Sir John producing anything more than a temporary glow.
“Why, how quiet you are, Glynne,” said Rolph, as they were on their way home.
“I was thinking,” she replied, quietly.
“What about?”
“About?—Oh, the wonders of—of what I have seen to-night.”
“Are you satisfied, my son?” said Mrs Alleyne, when she kissed him that night.