Mrs. Ullershaw breathed more freely. If there were anything in the wind about Edith he would not be taking the eight o’clock train.
“Go,” she said; “I’ll wait.”
Lady Devene was by herself, since amongst that gay throng of young people no one took much note of her, seated in a big oak chair on a little dais at the end of the hall far away from the fire and hot water coils, for she found the heat oppressive. As he made his way towards her even the preoccupied Rupert could not help noticing how imposing she looked in her simple black dress, which contrasted so markedly with her golden hair and white and massive face, set up there above them all, elbow on knee and chin on hand, her blue eyes gazing over their heads at nothingness. In reality, the miserable woman was greeting the New Year in her own fashion, not with gaiety and laughter, but with repentance for her sins during that which was past, and prayers for support during that which was to come.
“Ach, Rupert!” she said, rousing herself and smiling pleasantly as she always did at him, “it is kind of you to leave those young people and their jokes to come to talk with the German frau, for that is what they call me among themselves, and indeed what I am.”
“I am afraid,” he said, “I have only come to say good-night, or rather good-bye, for I must go to town to-morrow morning before you will be down.”
She looked at him sharply.
“So I have driven you away with my tale of troubles. Well, I thought that I should, and you are wise to leave this house where there is so much misery, dead and living, for no good thing can happen in it, no good thing can come out of it—”
“Indeed,” broke in Rupert, “that is not why I am going at all, it is because—” and he told her of the visit he must pay.
“You do not speak fibs well like the rest of them, Rupert; you have some other reason, I see it on your face, something to do with that dreadful Dick, I suppose, or his—ach! what is the English word—his flame, Edith. What? Has she been playing tricks with you too? If so, beware of her; I tell you, that woman is dangerous; she will breed trouble in the world like his lordship.”
Rupert felt very angry, then he looked at that calm, fateful face which a few hours before he had seen so impassioned, and all his anger died, and was replaced by a fear which chilled him from head to heel. He felt that this brooding, lonely woman had insight, born perhaps of her own continual griefs; that she saw deep into the heart of things. He who understood her, who sympathised with, even if he did not entirely adopt her stern religious views, who knew that prayer and suffering are the parents of true sight, felt sure that this sight was hers. At least he felt it for a moment, then the unpleasant conviction passed away, for how could its blackness endure in the light of the rosy optimism of new-risen and successful love?