She had an inclination to put her arms about Nelly Drummond as though she were a beautiful child. She was so glad Robin had remembered to bring her at last. It had been strange and lonely when he had ceased to come as he had been used to. It had been so pleasant to look up when his tap came at the door and to see his plain, pleasant face looking at her with a friendly smile. She had grown used to his visits all that winter through; and when they had ceased abruptly she had missed them more than she cared to acknowledge to herself. She had an impulse to take Nelly's hand to her breast and hold it there for comfort.
"And you are very happy?" she said again.
She was prepared for a happy girl's outpourings. What she was not prepared for was the sudden shadow that fell on Nelly's face, the weariness, as though she had been brought back to the thought of something disagreeable. A sudden wintriness went over her charming face. The eyes drooped, the lips trembled and were steadied with an effort.
"I ought to be very happy," she said. "Everyone is good to me. I have the dearest old father in the world and Robin is so kind and good. I ought to be very happy and to make other people happy."
But she was not happy! Mary stared at the golden head with incredulity. For the moment Nelly's mask—a transparent one enough at best—with which she faced the world was down. No happy girl had ever spoken so, looked so. And it wanted only a few weeks to her marriage!
Mary, no more logical than women less intellectual than she, felt as her first impulse a coldness, chilling her heart that had been so warm towards the girl Robin Drummond had chosen. The chill must have reached Nelly's delicate apprehension, for she looked up in a startled way.
"Robin promised me your friendship," she began.
"And, to be sure, it is yours," Mary Gray said, still wondering at the inexplicable thing that Robin Drummond's promised wife could have secret cause for unhappiness. She had no further inclination to caress the girl for whom she had been passed by. "We are going to be great friends," she said with a cold sweetness.
Then the kettle boiled over and created a diversion. While Mary was still mopping up the pool it had made on the floor Sir Robin returned. His voyage of discovery had not been in vain. He had indeed chartered a hansom to make it, and had brought back fascinating things in the way of cream and tea-cakes and other dainties. As he came in he glanced at the two whom he hoped to see friends. A shadow rested on Nelly's face. He saw nothing amiss with Mary Gray as she went to and fro, busy with the little meal, and had no fault to find with her words as they parted.
"We are going to be great friends, Miss Drummond and I," she said.