“No,” replied Lettice, surprised at his way of speaking. “He must have heard about us from Godfrey,” she decided. “At least, I hope not,” she added, as her terrible picture of Arthur in a brain fever came before her eyes. “I hope not. But I don’t know what I think or fear. You won’t be long?” she said appealingly, for by this time her new friend had handed her into the snug little carriage.
“Two minutes at most,” he replied.
And Lettice sat there, grateful in a sort of childish way for the cushioned warmth and comfort, though till then she had thought nothing about how cold she was, gazing before her in a vague, half-dazed way, feeling almost as if she would fall asleep if she were left there long, but in some indefinite way undoubtedly many degrees less miserable and desolate than before the apparition of the brougham.
Its owner was as good as his word Two minutes had barely elapsed before he was back again.
“I have his present address,” he said. “But he is a long way off. He is in Scotland, and is not expected back for a fortnight. He is away on professional business, but he had hoped not to have to go so far. He had hoped to be back to spend Christmas with us down in the country. Now,” he continued, “what is to be done? You can telegraph to him, but I doubt if it would be possible for him to come back, and it is an out-of-the-way place where he is. You said there was no time to be lost? Have you no one else, no other friend or—or relative?” Here his voice faltered as he looked anxiously into the girl’s face, so pale and drawn and careworn as it had again become.
She roused herself with a sort of effort.
“I don’t know what to do,” she repeated.
“Can you not, though I am a stranger, can you not make up your mind—we have been brought together so strangely—can you not tell me what is the matter?” he said, beseechingly almost.
All this time he was standing with his hand on the carriage door.
“If you would let me take you home—to my wife,” he continued, “you would see how kind and sympathising she is. Could you tell her, better?”