"'LET ME SEE IT,' SAID CAROLYN."
CHAPTER XI.
A KNOCK-DOWN BLOW.
After this Carolyn refused to talk of Lawrence or Prudence. She immediately decided to go back to their city house and go on with the winter precisely as usual.
Mrs. Ffolliott made two remarks, and then dropped the subject. One of these remarks was, "I can't tell how thankful I am that we didn't put on black, though I should have done it if you hadn't stopped us, I must say." The other was, "If your father had been living, Caro, things wouldn't have happened like this;" though how Carolyn's father would have prevented these things from happening was not explained.
The girl and her mother went everywhere and received the same as usual. After their five hundred friends had looked at Caro in great but partially concealed curiosity as to "how she took it," they all tried to act as if nothing had happened, and most of them conceded that it was wise of Miss Ffolliott to go right on with her ordinary life.
Some of them remarked, "But there is a curious look about her eyes, isn't there? I suppose she really cared for that man."
One afternoon in January, while Carolyn was in her own room, her furs still on, for she had just come in from a walk, a servant brought her a card. As she read "Lord Maxwell" on the pasteboard, her face changed. She hesitated an instant, then she said, "I will go down."
The gentleman was standing by the hearth; a thick yellow beard covered his chin, and this change so improved his appearance that Carolyn was surprised almost into doubting his identity.