“Forgive me if I disregard your advice, much as I respect your judgment upon all other subjects.”
“You have other views, I suppose, then?”
“Yes, I have other views.”
“You look higher?”
“Infinitely higher,” he answered, with his hands locked above his head in a carelessly graceful attitude, and with his eyes gazing at the fire.
He looked like a dreaming fawn: the large, full eyes, the small peaked beard, and close-cut hair upon the arched forehead were all suggestive of the satyr tribe.
The door opened, and Pamela came smiling in, self-conscious, yet happy, delighted at seeing that picturesque figure by the hearth.
CHAPTER VII.
THE TIME HAS COME.
Three days later Mildred and her young companion started for Italy. The doctor declared that the departure was premature—Mrs. Greswold was not strong enough to undertake such a fatiguing journey. But modern civilisation has smoothed the roads that lead over the civilised world, and for a lady who travels with a maid and a courier, journeys are rendered very easy; besides, Mildred had made up her mind to leave Brighton at any hazard.
The hour of parting came for Pamela and Castellani, and although the young lady took care to remind him at least a dozen times a day of that impending severance, not one word of the future, or of any cherished hope on his part, fell from his lips. And yet it had seemed to Pamela that he was devoted to her, that he only waited for the opportunity to speak. It seemed to her also that he felt the pain of parting, for he had an air of deepest melancholy daring these farewell days, and talked only of saddest themes. He was in Lewes Crescent nearly all day long—he played the mournfullest strains—he behaved like a man oppressed with a secret sorrow; but never a word of love or marriage did he breathe to Pamela. He pressed her hand gently, with an almost paternal affection, as she leant out of the carriage which was to take her to the station, and bade him a last good-bye.