"That does not alarm me; everybody is—except myself," and now her laugh had a cadence of sadness.
It touched him. He knew the task laid out for him by Providence, and he felt that he ought to say a fitting word. But all the time he knew that the eyes of the maid were upon him. The knowledge made him appear somewhat constrained—he who ordinarily had an ease of manner, which was not the least of his charms.
"They are well at Stormpoint, of course?" questioned Natalie. "Mrs. Joe and Paula?"
"Perfectly. You will be charmed with their home. Mrs. Claghorn has transformed a desert. The sea——"
"Paula sent me some views, and better, an appreciative description. I should think they would never wish to leave it—none of them?" She looked inquiringly at him.
"As to that," he laughed, "Mrs. Joe flits occasionally; and, of course, Paula with her. But they are becoming more and more content to remain at home. Mrs. Joe is quite a public character."
"A chatelaine—the head of the house?" Again her eyes questioned more insistently than her lips.
"Quite so," was the answer. "Mark's a rover. He's in Russia."
A sigh of relief—or regret? It was quickly checked. Leonard noticed her pallor. "You are tired," he said. "Why not rest for an hour or two here? If you will do so, I can myself drive you to Easthampton. Just now I must attend to my class at the Seminary."
But she would not wait for his escort; so he procured a conveyance, and surmising that, under the circumstances, the maid was an embarrassment, he suggested providing her with a book and the hospitality of his sitting-room, and having seen his cousin depart, he conducted Mademoiselle Berthe to his room and handed her a volume of the "Revue des Deux Mondes," which the maid accepted graciously.