"Marius must be so fatigued—he is rather pale, do you not think? And I wish he had brought Mr. Hardinge."
Miss Chressham reminded her gently.
"Mr. Hardinge had to accompany Mr. Brereton's son to London, and I expect Marius would not have cared to travel through England with a tutor."
She was grateful her mention of Selina Boyle's letter (that she had been nerving herself to for three days past) had passed without comment.
To attain this end she had chosen a moment of abstraction; Lady Lyndwood, weary with leisure, would most probably have desired to see the letter.
And Miss Chressham did not wish to show it to her.
Now Marius re-entered, fresh and elegant in grey satin, his eyes wonderfully dark under his powdered hair, a knot of thick lace at his throat and a fine pink cameo clasping it—a more animated Marius, a more charming Marius than the slightly ungainly lad from college who had, on occasion, flouted his mother and teased his cousin two years ago.
"Mr. Hardinge has done wonders, I swear," sighed the Countess, still striving with that sense of loss.
And Marius, too young to admit he had ever been different from what he was, blushed, and for a moment was awkward.
"'Tis only two years," he said; then he caught his mother's yearning gaze and became conscious of his modish side curls and all the little fopperies of his dress so delightfully new, and the fresh colour deepened in his smooth cheeks.