Chapter Twenty.
Mr Rawdon deliberately fastened his eye glasses on his nose, and looked down at the slip of paper. There was a dead breathless silence in the room.
“The name of the prize-winner is Etheldreda Saxon.”
It seemed to Dreda that her very heart stopped beating in that moment of wild, delirious joy. It was almost as though she had received a blow on her head, so dazed and paralysed did she appear; then dimly she was conscious of the sound of clapping and stamping, and looking across the room the four dear familiar faces stood out in bold relief, while all the others remained a mist and blur. Father quite pale, with his eyes shining like blue flames; mother with the tears streaming down her face—why did mothers always cry when they ought to be glad?—Rowena, one sweet, glowing smile of delight. Maud with her mouth wide open—one could almost hear her snore.
The clapping went on—everyone seemed to be staring in her direction, and someone was pressing her arm, and saying gently: “Go, dear—go! They are waiting for you. Go for your prize!”
It was Susan’s voice. Susan’s face was looking at her with the sweetest, kindest smile... With a start Dreda came back to herself, and as she did so half a dozen words sounded in her brain as distinctly as though spoken by a real human voice. “That is love!” said the voice. “That is the true love!” As she walked up the bare centre of the floor she was thinking not of her own triumph, but of Susan’s unselfish joy; it came to her mind that Susan’s triumph was greater than her own.
Once on the platform, however, face to face with Mr Rawdon, with Miss Drake by his side beaming with happy smiles, conscious of being the cynosure of every eye, it was impossible not to feel a natural pride and elation.
Before presenting the pile of handsomely bound volumes—ten in all—Mr Rawdon held out his hand with a very charming gesture of friendship.
“Etheldreda Saxon, I congratulate you on what you have achieved in the present; I congratulate you still more on what you are going to achieve in the future! My good friend Miss Drake, knowing of old my unmethodical methods, told me not to trouble to return the manuscripts of the various essays submitted for my criticism, but before leaving home to-day I put your typed copy in my pocket, thinking that you would naturally like to have it. I return it to you now, together with these books, which, to my mingled pride and embarrassment, have been chosen for your prize. I hope and expect that the time will come when those present this afternoon may feel it one of their happiest recollections that they were present on the occasion when Etheldreda Saxon received her first literary recognition.”