Her mother-in-law made a curt inquiry after her health, and her father-in-law supplemented it by a careless “Good-morning.”
Evidently her presence was unexpected and undesired by the small family.
The meal proceeded in embarrassing silence. Molly tried to eat, but it was a melancholy and mechanical proceeding. She burned her tongue with hot coffee, but she was afraid to cry out at the pain; she nearly choked herself trying to swallow things that she put into her mouth in the pretense of eating; and at last she gave it up and sat quiet, with her eyes on her plate, until the ordeal was over. How she groped her way to the morning-room she scarcely knew. Cecil had left the dining-room before her, and she followed slowly in his train.
He was cutting the leaves of a book for his mother. At Molly’s entrance he rose and placed a chair for her with distant courtesy.
She thanked him and sat down, and for some moments an embarrassing silence reigned.
Cecil broke it with a curt sentence that made Molly start.
“You are better?” he said.
“Thank you, oh, yes, much better,” she faltered, grateful for even this notice.
A glance at the pale, wan face did not assure him of the fact, but he went on, pitilessly:
“You no longer need the care of a sick-nurse?”