"Well, take it in its best light—that Mr. Dundyke fainted from the heat of the sun—the man must have been a brute to leave him alone," concluded Lizzie Fauntleroy.
"Yes," was the answer, as a faint colour rose to Mrs. Dundyke's cheek; "that I can never forgive."
The afternoon and the work progressed satisfactorily, and dinner time arrived. Miss Fauntleroy had invited Travice to come and partake of it, but he said he had an engagement—which she did not half believe. The nearly bed-ridden old aunt came down to it, and was propped up to the table in an invalid chair. Miss Fauntleroy took the head; Miss Lizzie the foot. It was a well-spread board: Lawyer Fauntleroy's daughters liked good dinners. Their manners were more free at home than abroad, rather scaring Mildred. "How could Travice have chosen here?" she mentally asked.
"There's no gentlemen present, so I don't see why I should not give you a toast," suddenly exclaimed Lizzie Fauntleroy, as the servant was pouring out the first glass of champagne. "The bridegroom and bride elect. Mr. Travice Ar——"
Lizzie stopped in surprise. Peeping in at the door, in a half-jocular, half-deprecatory manner, as if he would ask pardon for entering at the unseasonable hour, was Mr. Benjamin Carr. His somewhat dusty appearance, and his over-coat on his arm, showed that he had then come from the station after his Birmingham journey. Lizzie, too hearty to be troubled with superfluous reticence or ceremony of any kind, started up with a shout of welcome.
Of course everything was dis-arranged. The visitors looked up with surprise; Barbara turned round and gave him her hand. Ben began an apology for sitting down in the state he was, and had handed his coat to a servant, when he found a firm hand laid upon his arm. He wheeled round, wondering who it was, and saw a widow's cap, and a face he did not in the first moment recognise.
"Mr. Hardcastle!"
With the words, the voice, the recognition came to him, and the past scenes at Geneva rose before his startled memory as a vivid dream. He might have brazened it out had he been taken less utterly by surprise, but that unnerved him: his face turned ashy white, his whole manner faltered. He looked to the door as if he would have bolted out of it; but somebody had closed it again.
Mrs. Dundyke turned her face to the amazed listeners, who had risen from their seats. But that it had lost its colour also, there was no trace in it of agitation: it was firm, rigid, earnest; and her voice was calm even to solemnity.
"Before heaven, I assert that this is the man who in Geneva called himself Mr. Hardcastle, who did that injury—much or little, he best knows—to my husband! He——"