And restraining any further emotion, she laid her arms on the balustrade and gazed long and calmly into the purple depths and gleaming snows of the Rhône valley. Her hat oppressed her and she took it off, revealing the abundance of her delicately golden hair, which, in its lack of lustre and spring, seemed to share in the physical distress and loss of the whole personality.
The face was that of a doomed creature, incapable now of making any successful struggle for the right to live. What had been sensibility had become melancholy; the slight, chronic frown was deeper, the pale lips more pinched. Yet intermittently there was still great sweetness, the last effort of a "beautiful soul" meant for happiness, and withered before its time.
As Julie stood beside her, while Lady Blanche had gone to fetch a book from the salon, the poor child put out her hand and grasped that of Julie.
"It is quite possible I may get the letter to-night," she said, in a hurried whisper. "My maid went down to Montreux--there is a clever man at the post-office who tried to make it out for us. He thinks it'll be to-night."
"Don't be too disappointed if nothing comes," said Julie, caressing the hand. Its thinness, its icy and lifeless touch, dismayed her. Ah, how easily might this physical wreck have been her doing!
The bells of Montreux struck half-past six. A restless and agonized expectation began to show itself in all the movements of the invalid. She left her chair and began to pace the little terrace on Julie's arm. Her dragging step, the mournful black of her dress, the struggle between youth and death in her sharpened face, made her a tragic presence. Julie could hardly bear it, while all the time she, too, was secretly and breathlessly waiting for Warkworth's last words.
Lady Blanche returned, and Julie hurried away.
She passed through the hotel and walked down the Montreux road. The post had already reached the first houses of the village, and the postman, who knew her, willingly gave her the letters.
Yes, a packet for Aileen, addressed in an unknown hand to a London address, and forwarded thence. It bore the Denga postmark.