Helbeck, however, did not enlighten her. He talked indeed with no freedom, merely to pass the time.
She perfectly recognised that he was not at ease with her, and she hurried her meal, in spite of her very frank hunger, that she might set him free. But, as she was putting down her coffee-cup for the last time, she suddenly said:
"It's a very good air here, isn't it, Mr. Helbeck?"
"I believe so," he replied, in some surprise. "It's a mixture of the sea and the mountains. Everybody here—most of the poor people—live to a great age."
"That's all right! Then Augustina will soon get strong here. She can't do without me yet—but you know, of course—I have decided—about myself?"
Somehow, as she looked across to her host, her little figure, in its plain white dress and black ribbons, expressed a curious tension. "She wants to make it very plain to me," thought Helbeck, "that if she comes here as my guest, it is only as a favour, to look after my sister."
Aloud he said:
"Augustina told me she could not hope to keep you for long."
"No!" said the girl sharply. "No! I must take up a profession. I have a little money, you know, from papa. I shall go to Cambridge, or to London, perhaps to live with a friend. Oh! you darling!—you darling!"
Helbeck opened his eyes in amazement. Miss Fountain had sprung from her seat, and thrown herself on her knees beside his old collie Bruno. Her arms were round the dog's neck, and she was pressing her cheek against his brown nose. Perhaps she caught her host's look of astonishment, for she rose at once in a flush of some feeling she tried to put down, and said, still holding the dog's head against her dress: