But the fates had not done with Mr. Wycherly that day. As he and Miss Esperance sat down to supper, Montagu, who for some reason was rather later than usual in going to bed, came in to say good night to them. He first kissed his aunt, who sat at one end of the table, then went to kiss Mr. Wycherly who sat at the other. Having said good night, of course he lingered, leant confidingly against his tutor, and in the universal fashion of children who would fain put off the evil hour of bed, remarked detachedly: "You've got chops. Aunt Esperance has only got an egg. Don't you like chops, Aunt Esperance? I do, much better than eggs."
Mr. Wycherly dropped back in his chair, looking painfully distressed. For a moment there was a dreadful pause, but the beautiful breeding of Miss Esperance stood her in good stead even then.
"Do you know," she exclaimed, as though a sudden thought had struck her, "I feel unusually hungry to-night. I think I will defy my doctor for once, and take a chop after all, Mr. Wycherly."
And Miss Esperance handed up her little plate for the chop which Mr. Wycherly joyfully placed upon it. But now came another difficulty. Miss Esperance, who had eaten a boiled egg at this hour nearly every night for some twenty years, had no fork.
"Montagu, my son," she said cheerfully, "run and ask Elsa for a fork for me."
No man ever existed who cared less about eating than Mr. Wycherly. Whatsoever was set before him, that he ate meekly and without comment—if he remembered. He always offered to help Miss Esperance from whatever dish was set before him at supper, and she as invariably refused it. It would have seemed to him an unwarrantable piece of interference even so indirectly to criticise her housekeeping as to suggest what she should eat. But to-day there had occurred something which had entirely shaken him out of his usual patient acquiescence in existing conditions: so that, when Montagu pointed out that his fare was so much better than that of Miss Esperance, he was seized by a new anguish of self-reproach. Had he, all these years, been living luxuriously?—that is how poor Mr. Wycherly put it to himself—while she, who with her frail little hands had pulled him forcibly back from the abyss into which he was so surely slipping, had she been living sparely, and he never even noticed whether she had enough to eat? In his misery he was ready to accuse himself of having starved Miss Esperance that he might go full-fed himself.
It was rather a silent meal. Miss Esperance did her best to start topics of interest, but his response, though never lacking in urbane attention, was somewhat half-hearted and depressed.
When he had gone upstairs to his own room, Miss Esperance waited with the little bell, which summoned Elsa, still in her hand till that good woman appeared, when she asked anxiously: "Elsa, do you know if anything has occurred to upset Mr. Wycherly? He is not looking at all well to-night."
Elsa shook her head. "I dinna ken, mem, what it'll be, but he never touched his denner, and when he came back this afternoon he looked like he'd been greetin' and greetin' sair."
Elsa paused; Miss Esperance made no answer, but stood still, looking at the lamp on the table, lost in thought.