'Besides,' he continued, without noticing her interruption, 'Pamela writes to me this morning that she wants my consent to her training as an Army nurse.'
'Oh no,' cried Elizabeth—'not yet. She is too young!'
Her face showed her distress. So she was really driving this poor child, whom she would so easily have loved had it been allowed her, out of her home! No doubt Pamela had seized on the pretext of her 'row' with her father to carry out her threat to Elizabeth of 'running away,' and before Elizabeth's return to Mannering, so that neither the Squire nor any one else should guess at the real reason. But how could Elizabeth acquiesce?
Yet if she revealed the story of Pamela's attack upon her to the Squire, what would happen? Only a widening of the breach between him and his daughter. Elizabeth, of course, might depart, but Pamela would be none the more likely to return to face her father's wrath. And again for the hundredth time Elizabeth said to herself, in mingled pain and exasperation—'What did she mean?—and what have I ever done that she should behave so?'
Then she raised her eyes. Something impelled her—as it were a strong telepathic influence. The Squire was gazing at her. His expression was extraordinarily animated. It seemed to her that words were already on his lips, and that at all costs she must stop them there.
But fortune favoured her. There was a knock at the library door. The Squire irritably said, 'Come in!' and Forest announced, 'Captain Dell.' The Squire, with some muttered remark, walked across to his own table.
The agent entered with a beaming countenance. All that he knew was that the only competent person in a rather crazy household had returned to it, and that business was now likely to go forward. He had brought some important letters, and he laid them nominally before his employer, but really before Elizabeth. He and she talked; the Squire smoked and listened, morosely aloof. Yet by the end of the agent's visit a grudging but definite consent had been given to the great timber deal; and Elizabeth hurried off as Captain Dell departed—thankful for the distant sound of the first bell for dinner.
Sitting up in bed that night, with her hands behind her head, while a westerly wind blew about the house, Elizabeth again did her best to examine both her conscience and her situation.
The summons which had taken her home had been a peremptory one. Her mother, who had been ill for a good many months, had suddenly suffered some brain injury, which had reduced her to a childish helplessness. She did not recognize Elizabeth, and though she was very soon out of physical danger, the mental disaster remained. A good nurse was now more to her than the daughter to whom she had been devoted. A good nurse was in charge, and Elizabeth had persuaded an elderly cousin, living on a small annuity, to come and share her mother's rooms. Now what was more necessary than ever was—money! Elizabeth's salary was indispensable.