But Miss Fountain did not intend to be forgotten. She made him relieve her of all burdens, and then argue an overcharge with the flyman. And at last, when all the luggage was in and the fly was driving off, she mounted the steps deliberately, looking about her all the time, but principally at the house. The eyes of the housekeeper, who with Mr. Helbeck was standing in the entrance awaiting her, surveyed both dog and mistress with equal disapproval.
But the dusk was fast passing into darkness, and it was not till the girl came into the brightness of the hall where her stepmother was already sitting tired and drooping on a settle near the great wood fire, that Helbeck saw her plainly.
She was very small and slight, and her hair made a spot of pale gold against the oak panelling of the walls. Helbeck noticed the slenderness of her arms, and the prettiness of her little white neck, then the freedom of her quick gesture as she went up to the elder lady and with a certain peremptoriness began to loosen her cloak.
"Augustina ought to go to bed directly," she said, looking at Helbeck.
"The journey tired her dreadfully."
"Mrs. Fountain's room is quite ready," said the housekeeper, holding herself stiffly behind her master. She was a woman of middle age, with a pinkish face, framed between two tiers of short grey curls.
Laura's eye ran over her.
"You don't like our coming!" she said to herself. Then to Helbeck—
"May I take her up at once? I will unpack, and put her comfortable. Then she ought to have some food. She has had nothing to-day but some tea at Lancaster."
Mrs. Fountain looked up at the girl with feeble acquiescence, as though depending on her entirely. Helbeck glanced from his pale sister to the housekeeper in some perplexity.
"What will you have?" he said nervously to Miss Fountain. "Dinner, I think, was to be at a quarter to eight."