An unexpected and startling event—to be detailed in its place—did happen, and was duly recorded, but was unnoticed by them; and those who did see it, cared not to speak or write of it, while others were unaware of the deep and vital interest it possessed for them both.
'Dear Olive, but for you coming to me I think I might have lost my life—my reason—certainly my peace of mind—everything!' exclaimed the affectionate and effusive Eveline, wreathing her soft white arms round her cousin's neck, and nestling her face therein.
The first day she was 'downstairs' was quite an event at Hurdell Hall, so great was the fuss made of her by the baronet and his sister.
In her dressing-room she had been fully attired in her crape dress by Clairette, who might as well have dressed a lav-figure for all the apparent power of volition there was in Eveline. Again and again she had tried to bathe her cheeks into some colour, to smooth her hair, and went with slow reluctant steps to the drawing-room at last; and there the extreme depth of her mourning, her girlish face and figure, and her pure whiteness of complexion—the soft white of the arum lily—made her delicate beauty seem more striking than ever.
Sir Harry was beside himself with pleasure, and when he rejoined the ladies in the drawing-room after dinner, and after all the champagne he had imbibed at table, his attention and extreme effusiveness were such that Eveline was compelled at last to say, coldly,
'Sir Harry, I wish you would go away and leave me—leave me to my own thoughts.'
He urged his extreme joy at seeing her again after her long seclusion.
Eveline had now a horror of Hurdell Hall. It was associated in her mind with three dire calamities—Evan's death—though she had first heard of that from Sir Harry in London; Sir Paget's terrible catastrophe, and, collaterally with it, the strange disappearance of her darling brother.
She must get away, without delay, she thought, as the atmosphere of the place seemed to oppress her. So, in a few days, arrangements were complete for her departure to join her parents, who were still at Southsea.
Well, that was not a thousand miles from Hurdell Hall, thought Sir Harry; and it was too soon to venture on the subject of love or marriage yet; but a time would come, and a jolly one he doubted not it would be.