The door opened, and Lady Lucy came quietly in. Sir James looked at her sharply as they shook hands. She had more color than usual; but the result was to make the face look older, and certain lines in it disagreeably prominent. Very likely she had been crying. He hoped she had.
"Oliver told you to expect me?"
She assented. Then, still standing, she looked at him steadily.
"This is a very terrible affair, Sir James."
"Yes. It must have been a great shock to you."
"Oh! that does not matter," she said, impatiently. "I must not think of myself. I must think of Oliver. Will you sit down?"
She motioned him, in her stately way, to a seat. He realized, as he faced her, that he beheld her in a new aspect. She was no longer the gracious and smiling hostess, as her familiar friends knew her, both at Tallyn and in London. Her manner threw a sudden light on certain features in her history: Marsham's continued dependence on his mother and inadequate allowance, the autocratic ability shown in the management of the Tallyn household and estates, management in which Marsham was allowed practically no share at all, and other traits and facts long known to him. The gentle, scrupulous, composed woman of every day had vanished in something far more vigorously drawn; he felt himself confronted by a personality as strong as, and probably more stubborn than his own.
Lady Lucy seated herself. She quietly arranged the folds of her black satin dress; she drew forward a stool, and rested her feet upon it. Sir James watched her, uncertain how to begin. But she saved him the decision.
"I have had a painful interview with my son" she said, quietly. "It could not be otherwise, and I can only hope that in a little while he will do me justice. Oliver will join us presently. And now--first, Sir James, let me ask you--you really believe that Miss Mallory has been till now in ignorance of her mother's history?"
Sir James started.