Her house had been decorated and furnished under her own direction, and was marked in all particulars by that grain of Puritanism which was noticeable in the lady’s attire. The carpets and curtains in the two drawing-rooms were silver-gray; the furniture was French, and belonged to the period of the Directory, when the graceful lightness of the Louis Seize style was merging into the classicism of the Empire. In Miss Fausset’s drawing-room there were none of those charming futilities which cumber the tables of more frivolous women. Here Mr. Cancellor would have found room, and to spare, for his hat—room for a committee meeting, or a mission service, indeed—on that ample expanse of silvery velvet pile, a small arabesque pattern in different shades of gray.
The grand piano was the principal feature of the larger room, but it was not draped or disguised, sophisticated by flower-vases, or made glorious with plush, after the manner of fashionable pianos. It stood forth—a concert grand, in unsophisticated bulk of richly carved rosewood, a Broadwood piano, and nothing more. The inner room was lined with bookshelves, and had the air of a room that was meant for usefulness rather than hospitality. A large, old-fashioned rosewood secrétaire, of the Directory period, occupied the space at the side of the wide single window, which commanded a view of dead walls covered with Virginia creeper, and in the distance a glimpse of the crocketed spire of St. Edmund’s, a reproduction in little of one of the turrets of the Sainte Chapelle.
Two-thirds of the volumes in those tall bookcases were of a theological character; the remaining third consisted of those standard works which everybody likes to possess, but which only the superior few care to read.
Mildred had telegraphed in the morning to announce her visit, and she found her aunt’s confidential man-servant, a German Swiss, and her aunt’s neat little brougham waiting for her at the station. Miss Fausset herself was in the inner drawing-room ready to receive her.
There was something in the chastened colouring and perfect order of that house in Lewes Crescent which always chilled Mildred upon entering it after a long interval. It was more than three years since she had visited her aunt, and this afternoon in the fading light the silver-gray drawing-rooms looked colder and emptier than usual.
Miss Fausset rose to welcome her niece, and imprinted a stately kiss on each cheek.
“My dear Mildred, you have given me a very agreeable surprise,” she said; “but I hope it is no family trouble that has brought you to me—so suddenly.”
She looked at her niece searchingly with her cold gray eyes. She was a handsome woman still, at fifty-seven years of age. Her features were faultless, and the oval of her face was nearly as perfect as it had been at seven-and-twenty. Her abundant hair was silvery gray, and worn à la Marie Antoinette, a style which lent dignity to her appearance. Her dinner-gown of dark gray silk fitted her tall, upright figure to perfection, and her one ornament, an antique diamond cross, half hidden by the folds of her lace fichu, was worthy of the rich Miss Fausset.
“Yes, aunt, it is trouble that has brought me to you—very bitter trouble; but it is just possible that you can help me to conquer it. I have come to you for help, if you can give it.”
“My dear child, you must know I would do anything in my power—” Miss Fausset began, with gentle deliberation.