The two girls lived on, happy and contented. To them came no word of what was going on at Wellfield. They knew nothing of the long parley which their best-beloved was even then standing to hold with baseness and dishonesty, while honour and honesty stood by. Had they known, they too could have told him what perhaps his own conscience had more than once whispered to him: that honour and honesty will not continue such a parley for ever. They will not always remain there, holding out their neglected hands for us to clasp. There comes a time when they will wait no longer, but will withdraw their hands, fold their mantles around them, turn away, and leave us to consort with the company ourselves have chosen.
CHAPTER II.
LEBENDE BILDER.
Ten days later, Sara, sitting one morning in her atelier, heard a knock at her door, and answered abstractedly ‘ Herein!’
Looking up to see who might be her visitor, she saw a little lady in widow’s weeds.
‘Frau Goldmark!’ she exclaimed, rising in astonishment. Frau Goldmark was the widow of that young artist of promise, of whose sudden death Wilhelmi had informed her. Sara had heard constant talk of her for the last few days, to which talk she had listened in a vague, unheeding way. Her acquaintance with her was very slight, and had never before gone so far as an exchange of visits, and she was proportionately surprised to see her now, and under the existing circumstances, in her atelier.
‘Yes, liebe Miss Ford, it is I. And you may well look astonished, but do only hear me.’
‘Come into my sitting-room, then, Frau Goldmark, and tell me what I can do for you,’ said Sara, leading the way to where Avice was seated with a book in the parlour.