"Good-evening, Mr. Fairfax," she said. "Isn't Austin here?"
"Not at this moment. How do you do, Mrs. Granger?" and they shook hands. So commonplace a meeting might almost have disappointed the sentimental porter.
"And Bessie?" Clarissa asked.
"She too is out of the way for the moment," replied George Fairfax,
glancing out of the window. "You came in your carriage, I suppose, Mrs.
Granger? If you'll excuse me for a moment, I'll just run and see if—if
Austin has come in again."
He went quickly out of the room and downstairs, not to look for Austin Lovel, who was on his way to Brussels by this time, but to tell Mrs. Granger's coachman she had no farther use for the carriage, and would not be home to dinner. The man looked a little surprised at this order, but Mr. Fairfax's tone was too peremptory to be unauthorised; so he drove homeward without hesitation.
Clarissa was seated in her favourite easy-chair, looking pensively at the wood-fire, when George Fairfax came back. She heard his returning footsteps, and the sharp click of a key turning in the outer door. This sound set her wondering. What door was that being locked, and by whom?
Mr. Fairfax came into the painting-room. It was the crisis of his life, he told himself. If he failed to obtain some promise from her to-night—some definite pledge of his future happiness—he could never hope to succeed.
"Time and I against any two," he had said to himself sometimes in relation to this business. He had been content to bide his time; but the golden opportunity had come at last. If he failed to-night, he failed forever.
"Is he coming?" Clarissa asked, rather anxiously. There was something ominous in the stillness of the place, and the absence of any sign of life except George Fairfax's presence.
"Not immediately. Don't alarm yourself," he said hurriedly, as Clarissa rose with a frightened look. "There is nothing really wrong, only there are circumstances that I felt it better to break to you gently. Yet I fear I am an awkward hand at doing that, at the best. The fact is, your brother has left Paris."