CHAPTER XLIII
A Man’s Pain.
Lawrence received his first intimation of what had happened through Gwen; as Paddy had foreseen.
He had been sitting most of the morning in his den, with the London newspapers, the lovers having all taken themselves off, with an air that forbade any one to follow on their peril, but he had not done much reading. Small wonder, indeed! Why read of stocks and shares, of wars and rumours of Wars, of the vagaries of Cabinet Ministers, and the sweet, childlike levity of Irish members—when the happiness for which your whole life seems to have been waiting is coming to you to-day?
No, Lawrence did not read, he sat instead, gazing into the fire, making delightful plans for the future, in which Paddy was all in all. The chair she had sat in was pulled up to the hearth, but he had not used it since; he felt it was her chair now, and his fancy loved to see her sitting there still, with her two little hands clasping the two arms, and her head leaning back with that slight air of weariness which somehow made her only the more enchanting.
He was strangely happy that one morning, there had never been anything in all his life before in the least like it. In the afternoon he meant to go and look for her by the loch; he believed she would be waiting for him—and if not, well he would go to the Parsonage and claim her.
He went over the interview in his fancy, detail by detail, as it might be, as he would like it to be.
Paddy would be shy, that was a delicious thought to him. He had known too many of the women who meet a man half-way without the slightest qualm, and practically thrust his first kiss upon him, thinking of it only as one of many to follow. How different it would be with Paddy! He even wondered, with a little inward smile, whether she would let him kiss her at all this first interview, or at any rate before they were just parting. He did not mean to press her or hurry her in any way. Once having her promise, he could afford to wait.
Still it was deliriously sweet to think of, and he sat forward with his arms across his knees picturing the sacred moment. He thought how he would coax her, and how she would yield gradually, and then he would fold her in his arms and hold her tight against his heart while their lips met.
He was roused by a step coming along the passage to his door, a hurried step, that had a suggestion of being agitated in some way. Then the door opened, and Gwen put her head in to see if he was there. Finding he was, she came in and shut the door quietly behind her, and something in the quiet of her usually radiant face was ominous.