“It is impossible, it is absolutely impossible,” I said. “Her own mother would be unable to recognise her. She is altered beyond recognition. Why, that dead woman would by this time be nearly thirty years of age; whereas Miriam doesn't look two-and-twenty. Besides, the whole character and expression of her face are changed. There remain the same bony structure and the same general complexion: that is all that remains the same. Confess that the thing is impossible.”
“When he saw her, he started and coloured up.”
“Well, even so. What of it. He started and coloured up. What does that prove? Perhaps it was because of her resemblance to the dead woman, whom we will suppose him to have known. But as for identifying them as one and the same, he'd never dream of it. A merry, innocent young girl, of one or two-and-twenty, and a sad-eyed, sorrow-stricken, sinful woman, eight years her senior! The thing is on the face of it absurd. Absurd, too, is the supposition that he ever knew Louise Massarte at all. He started and coloured up at sight of Miriam, for the very simple reason of her exceeding beauty. He is a young man, and he is an artist. What quick-blooded young man, what artist, would not colour up at the sight of so beautiful a girl? Or else, it is imaginable, he has seen Miriam herself somewhere before—in the street, in an omnibus, or where not—and has been impressed by her loveliness; and then he started for surprise and pleasure at finding himself under the same roof with her. You, my good Josephine, you have jumped to a most unwarranted conclusion. Your fear was the father of your thought.—Afterwards, for instance? Did he follow up his start with such conduct as was calculated to justify you in your suspicion?”
“No. He simply returned our salutations, and behaved toward her as he did toward me—as if she were a perfectly new acquaintance.”
“Good! And then, consider the freedom and the nonchalance with which he talked to her at luncheon. No, no; it is impossible. Well, I will keep an eye upon him during dinner. And when you and Miriam leave us to our cigars, I'll seek to find out what the true explanation of the matter may be.”
And my sister and I descended to the drawing-room.
CHAPTER XI.—REASSURANCE.
Throughout the meal that followed, I carefully observed Fairchild's bearing toward my niece; and great was my satisfaction to see in it only and exactly what under the circumstances could rightly have been expected. Frank, gay, interested, attentive, yet undeviatingly courteous, respectful, and even deferential, it was precisely the bearing due from a young gentleman of good breeding toward the lady at whose side he found himself, and whose acquaintance he had but lately made.