"I think you must have been watching us all--all who went in, and all who came out," said Miss Blake. The agent smiled as he disclaimed the imputation: and with that they parted.
"Those flowers were so much admired and appreciated, Maclean," said Miss Blake to the gardener as she passed the lodge--where he sat at tea with his wife--the door open. "There are no such hothouse flowers anywhere as yours."
Maclean rose and thanked her for the compliment. She passed rapidly on, and entered the house by the window of the North room.
"I wonder where Lucy is?--Dressing, perhaps; or seated at the window looking out for her husband. Foolish child! Does he deserve that love?"
Treading softly on the carpeted staircase, her knock at Lady Andinnian's door and her entrance were simultaneous. Lucy, in her white morning dress with its blue ribbons, was standing up beside her husband. His arm was round her waist, her face lay upon his breast, his own bent down upon it.
It was an awkward moment for Miss Blake; she bit her lips as she stammered an apology. Lucy, blushing and laughing, drew away. Karl stood his ground, laughing too.
"I did not know you had returned, Sir Karl."
"I have just come; three minutes ago," he said, holding out his hand. "Lucy was telling me you had gone to a kettledrum, and I saucily assured her she must have dreamt it. Fancy kettledrums at Foxwood!"
They separated for the purpose of dressing, Miss Blake biting her lips still as she went to her room. The little matter had turned her hot and cold. Do as she would, she could not get rid entirely of her love for Karl Andinnian, in spite of the chronic resentment she indulged towards him.
"If this is jealousy," she murmured, sitting down to think, and undoing her veil with fingers that thrilled to their extreme ends, "I must indeed school myself. I thought I had learned to bear calmly."