The rosy hue stole over her face again, and a happy smile parted her lips. “I once said to mamma, when we had been spending the evening there, that I should like to live at Hazeldon House. I like its rooms and its situation; I shall like to be busy among all those poor old people, but, when I said it, William, I had not the slightest idea that the chance would ever be mine.”
“You have only to determine now how soon the ‘chance’ shall become certainty,” he said. “I must take up my residence there within a month, and I do not care how soon my wife takes up hers after that.”
The rose grew deeper. She bent her brow down upon her hand and his, hiding her face. “It could not possibly be, William.”
“What could not be?”
“So soon. Papa and mamma are going to Germany, you know, and I must keep house here. Besides, what would Lady Augusta say at my leaving her situation almost as soon as I have entered upon it?”
“Lady Augusta—” Mr. Yorke was beginning impulsively, but checked himself. Constance lifted her face and looked at him. His brow was knit, and a stern expression had settled on it.
“What is it, William?”
“I want to know what caused your grief just now,” was his abrupt rejoinder. “And what is it that has made you appear so strange of late?”
The words fell on her as an ice-bolt. For a few brief moments she had forgotten her fears, had revelled in the sunshine of the happiness so suddenly laid out before her. Back came the gloom, the humiliation, the terror.
“Had Arthur been guilty of the charge laid to him, and you were cognizant of it, I could fancy that your manner would be precisely what it is,” answered Mr. Yorke.