Long after Joseph had gone Mrs. Malison and Annette talked in the mother’s room, with low, painfully murmuring voices, taking counsel together into the small hours. It was three of the clock when the hurrying of soft footsteps and a touch at the chamber door startled them, and then a piteous voice:
“Momsey; oh, momsey!”
The mother was up on the instant, opening the door; by the light in the hall, Tina’s eyes, ice-blue, stared at her over the lace frills of her night-dress. “I came to tell you—if you feel like that—the way you looked to-day—I’ll tell Francis I won’t marry him; it will kill me; but if you are happy it doesn’t make any difference. I can’t stand seeing you look like that! It will kill me, but you’ll be happier, any way.”
“Oh, dear me!” said Mrs. Malison in despair—anxiety lent roughness to her voice. “This is nonsense, Tina. Come up-stairs this minute. The idea! with nothing on your feet—you’ll get your death of cold.” She led the girl to her own bed, tucking the soft form with resolute fingers, and lying down herself afterwards under the coverlet with her cheek against Tina’s chill flesh.
“Oh, Tina, as if mother could ever be glad if you were unhappy! It’s just because I fear that if you have what you want that it will only be for your unhappiness that I look as I do. If your father were only at home!”
Tina gave a movement of impatience, though she lay close cuddled in her mother’s arms. “I think it would have been a great deal better if we had eloped—Francis and I,” she murmured.
“Tina!” The mother gave a horrified gasp.
“Well, I do think so—it would have saved everything, all the feeling so badly, and the talk, and everything. Francis and I wanted to go off in the automobile this afternoon and get married then, and settle it all at once. People never seem to mind a bit after it’s all over—the Boggses made such a fuss about Lucy’s marrying that widower and now nobody says a word about it. She comes to Sunday-night’s tea with his children.”
“But you didn’t elope, my darling,” said Mrs. Malison, searching for the one crumb of comfort.
“Francis thought you might mind.”