She was suffocated with shame, hot with anger. There was no memory of a swift sudden joy, such as swept over Lawson that moment, standing in his room alone; remembrance was burnt out by angry resentment at herself and him. She hated him for the agony she felt. It was against such an hour as this her first instincts had warned her and she had not heeded. She would heed now. She would never see him again, were it possible; and, that being impossible, she would find ways of putting days before the evil moment.
When she heard her father in the hall she stumbled to her feet, she bathed her hot face and straightened her stock and smoothed her rumpled hair; but when she flashed the electric light into the bulb above her mirror, she shrank back affrighted from the face pictured there. She could never go down with such a tale written on it as she herself could read. She began slowly walking up and down her long, high-ceilinged room, pressing back her tormented thoughts behind the doors of resolve. Had she been given to headaches or sudden small illnesses, how gladly would she have pleaded them, but such would have been so abnormal as to demand a physician. She smiled as she thought of her father's and Susan's dismay and Dr. Randall's swift summons; and, thinking of others, she won self-control.
She went down the stair, slowly at first, and then, near the foot, with swift step and eyes averted from the spot there beneath the circle of white light.
Her father looked up with dreamy eyes. He was absorbed in his books. Frances drew a little sobbing breath of relief. She would not be called upon to make any effort. She picked up a well-thumbed and well-loved copy of Burroughs and slipped into her chair. The book lay open on her knees; she knew her father was heedless of the unturned leaves.
But at the supper table, a cup clattered against a saucer as she handed them, Susan saw; the food on her plate was untouched, jealous black eyes from the half-opened pantry door watched—she was white, her gray eyes were dark and troubled—jealous eyes of an old bent darkey who would have shut every trouble from her, heeded, and keenly enough contrasted them with the brilliant laughing face she had looked into when she opened the door in the dusk of the afternoon. There had been one visitor since then; she knew at whose door to lay the blame.
When Frances came into the kitchen an hour later with a great pretence of gayety the old woman read her through and through.
"Susan, just think," she cried, "I'm going away on an early train to-morrow!"
"'Fore Gawd!" said Susan to herself, "it's wuss than I thought."
"You'll give me an early breakfast?" coaxingly.