"He is always like that," she said at last. "We took him to the Hippodrome and he only yawned, even when Seeth's lions came on. He didn't take the smallest interest."
"Begging your pardon, ma'am, that he did," the nurse interposed. "He were flinging 'imself on his precious 'ead twenty times a day for a week after. 'Twas a wonder he had any 'ead left, the precious lamb. Them there dratted clowns, I don't 'old with them nohow!"
The reconciliation between Bunny's mother and Bunny's friend and admirer was complete by the time they went down to lunch. Nelly had begged for Bunny's presence at the meal, and so the young monarch of all he surveyed was seated opposite to her in his high chair, with a napkin tucked under his chin, playing a fandango with a spoon and fork on the little table in front of him. Bunny filled the lunch-hour, Bunny's sayings and doings—there were not many of the former, but his mother managed to extract gems of wit and wisdom from his taciturnity—Bunny's likes and dislikes, Bunny's amazing development.
Only once was Langrishe's name mentioned. He had sent home a beautiful mug of beaten silver for Bunny. At the sound of his name Nelly's eyes were suddenly startled: she caught her breath; the colour swept over her face and ebbed away, leaving her paler than before.
Presently the luncheon-hour was over and Bunny had been carried off for his afternoon's outing. The half-hour or so in the drawing-room was over. Nelly was drawing on her gloves, standing by the window which over-looked the narrow slip of square, invisible now for the flowers on the balcony. The fateful visit was nearly at an end and Godfrey Langrishe's name had been mentioned only once.
She had a wild thought that her one opportunity was slipping out of her grasp. She had come here to have news of him. She must not come again. She must try and forget that he existed till such time at least as she could think of him calmly. Now she must know, she must hear, what was happening to him away there at the end of the world.
She glanced furtively around the pretty room, to which she would not come again. It was as though she said farewell to its comfort and pleasantness. She was not going to see Bunny and his mother again, not for a long time at least. Her gaze came back to the window, pausing ever so slightly on its way to glance at a portrait of Langrishe which hung on the wall, a portrait painted in the days when he had been his uncle's heir, by a great painter. She had been conscious all the time she had been in the room of the presence of the portrait although she had not looked its way. The picture had caught the quiet passion and intensity of Godfrey Langrishe's gaze, as though he looked on deeds of glory and fought his way towards them. The face was less stern than she remembered it; it had yet some of the bloom and bonniness of his boyhood; renunciation had not written its deeper meaning in lines about the lips and eyes.
She opened her mouth to speak of him, but at first no words would come. The fastening of her glove took all her attention it seemed. She had turned to the light for it, away from Mrs. Rooke's sympathetic glances.
She had almost controlled her voice to speak without trembling when the thing was taken out of her hands.
"I must not let you go," Mrs. Rooke said, "without giving you a message from Godfrey. A message and gift. It came a week ago. See—here it is. I was going to post it to you." She took up a packet from the side-table.