Julia stood over her dressed for flight, and a chill of despair seized her.
“Oh, mother, try—try,” she whispered.
“I am trying, Julie. I am fighting so hard, but you cannot realise the step I am trying to take; you cannot see it, my child, as it is spread before me.”
“Let us stay then,” whispered Julie, “and to-morrow I will appeal to Sir Gordon to come to our help.”
“No,” said Mrs Hallam, firmly, as if the words of her child had given her strength, “we can ask help of no one in such a strait as this, Julie; the act must be mine and mine alone; but now the time has come, my child, I feel that it is too much.”
“Mother!” sobbed Julie, “that man horrifies me. You heard all that my father said. I would sooner die than become his wife.”
Mrs Hallam caught her arm with a sharp grip, and remained silent for a few moments. “Yes,” she said at last, “and much as I love you, my own, I would sooner see you dead than married to such a man as he. You have given me the courage I failed in, my darling. For myself, I would live and bear until the end; but I am driven to it—I am driven to it. Come.”
They were standing in the dark, and now for the time being Mrs Hallam seemed transformed. Gathering her cloak about her, she went quickly to the door and listened, and then turned and whispered to Julia.
“Come at once,” she said. “Follow me down.” Julia drew a long breath and followed her, trembling, the boards of the lightly-built house cracking loudly as she passed quickly to the stairs. And again in the silence and darkness these cracked as they passed down.
In the hall Mrs Hallam hesitated for a moment, and then, putting her lips to Julia’s ear: