“No. How could I eat when I was so wretched about papa?”
Richard shook his head reproachfully.
“My darling Nell!” he said, “you promised me just now that you’d be a good girl, and trust in Providence. I shall take you somewhere and give you some supper, and then you must promise me to go home and get a good night’s rest.”
“I will do whatever you tell me, Richard,” Eleanor answered, submissively, “but let me go home first, please, and see if papa has come back.”
The scene-painter did not for a few moments reply to this request, but he answered presently in an abstracted tone:
“You shall do what you like, Nell.”
He told the coachman to drive to the Rue de l’Archevêque, but he would not let Eleanor alight from the vehicle when they reached the corner of the street and the little butcher’s shop, eager as she was to spring out and run into the house.
“Stay where you are, Nell,” he said authoritatively. “I will make all inquiries.”
Eleanor obeyed him. She was exhausted by a weary night of watching, a long day of agitation and anxiety, and she was too weak to oppose her old friend. She looked hopelessly up at the open windows on the entresol. They were exactly as she had left them four or five hours ago. No glimmer of light gave friendly token that the rooms were occupied.
Richard Thornton talked to the butcher’s wife for a long time, as it seemed to Eleanor; but he had very little to tell her when he came back to the carriage. Mr. Vane had not returned: that was all he said.