A lady was sitting by the fire, dressed in a dark-blue gown, which contrasted wonderfully with the auburn tints of her hair, and the transparent pallor of her complexion. As she rose and turned her face towards John Treverton, he saw that she was indeed a very beautiful young woman, and there was something in her beauty which took him a little by surprise, in spite of what he had heard from his companion in the gig.
‘Thank God you have come in time, Mr. Treverton,’ she said earnestly—an earnestness which John Treverton was inclined to consider hypocritical. What interest could she have in his arrival? What feeling could there be between them but jealousy?
‘I suppose she feels so secure about the old man’s will that she can afford to be civil,’ he thought as he seated himself by the fireside, after two or three polite commonplaces about his journey. ‘There is no hope of my cousin’s recovery, I suppose?’ he hazarded presently.
‘Not the faintest,’ Laura Malcolm answered, very sadly. ‘The London physician was here for the last time to-day. He has been down every week for the last two months. He said to-day that there would be no occasion for him to come any more; he did not think papa—I have always called your cousin by that name—could live through the night. He has been less restless and troubled since then, and he is now sleeping very quietly. He may linger a little longer than the physician seemed to think likely; but beyond that I have no hope whatever.’
This was said with a quiet, restrained manner that was more indicative of sorrow than any demonstrative lamentation could have been. There was something almost like despair in the girl’s look and tone—a dreary hopelessness—as if there were nothing left for her in life when the friend and protector of her girlhood should be taken from her. John Treverton watched her closely as she sat looking at the fire, with her dark eyes shrouded by their long lashes. Yes, she was very beautiful. That was a fact about which there was no possibility of doubt. Those large hazel eyes alone would have given a charm to the plainest face, and in this face there was no fault to be redeemed.
‘You seem to be much attached to my cousin, Miss Malcolm,’ Mr. Treverton said presently.
‘I love him dearly,’ she answered, looking up at him with those deep, dark eyes, which had a melancholy expression to-night. ‘I have had no one else to care for since I was quite a child; and he has been very good to me. I should be something worse than ungrateful if I did not love him as I do.’
‘And yet your life must have been a trying one, as the sole companion of an old man of Jasper Treverton’s eccentric temper. I speak of him as I have heard him described by my father. You must have found existence with him rather troublesome now and then, I should think.’
‘I very soon learnt to understand him, and to bear all the little changes in his humour. I knew that his heart was noble.’
‘Humph!’ thought John Treverton. ‘Women can do these things better than men. I couldn’t stand being shut up with a crusty old fellow for a week.’