She had neither meant to say this, nor in cold blood would she have allowed it to be true; but she was carried away by the subtle influence of the familiar place, by the sight of the books she used to borrow, and many an indefinable recollection and influence besides.
He gave a little short laugh. “That is the second time to-night,” he said, “that I have heard the same thing said.” If she had but known who the other was who had said it, the old man breaking stones, who had been so glad of his twopence! Mr. Penton could not restrain the brief comment of that laugh.
“It does not matter who says it,” said Alicia, “it is true. A thing is done in passion, in misery: and then it is hard to descend from our pride, or to acknowledge ourselves wrong. And you will think, perhaps,” she added, quickly, with rising color, “that it is a selfish motive that brings me here to-day?”
Edward Penton shook his head. “A selfish motive would mean that I could be of use to you; and I don’t think that is very probable,” he said.
Mrs. Russell Penton colored still more. “Edward,” she said, faltering a little, “it is curious, when there is an object on which one has set one’s heart, how one is led on to do things that only in the doing appear in their true colors. I have let you think I came to renew old friendship—to see your children, your girls.” She grew more and more agitated as she went on, and there came out in her a hundred tones and looks of the old Alicia, who had seemed to him to have no connection with this mature dignified self-important woman—looks and tones which moved him as the old books in the corner, and all the associations of the place, had moved her.
“It does not matter why you have come; I am glad you have come, anyhow; and if I can do anything—” he made a pause, and laughed again, this time at himself. “It doesn’t seem very likely, looking at you and at me; but you know I was always your faithful servant,” he said.
“There is only one thing I have to say for myself, Edward—I would not allow the proposal to be made to you by any one but me.”
“What is it?” he asked. There was a proposal then, and it was something to benefit her! Edward Penton’s bosom swelled with perhaps the first pleasurable sense of his own position which he had felt for years. Penton had always been an excitement to him, but there had been little pleasure in it. For a moment, however, now, he felt himself the old, the young Edward Penton, who had been the faithful servant of Alicia. He could not imagine anything which he could have it in his power to do for her, but still less could he imagine anything which he would refuse.
She went on with a hesitation which was very far from being natural to her. “You know,” she said, “that when my father dies, which is an event that can not be far distant, I shall have to give up—the only home I have ever known.”
His attention was fully aroused now. He looked at her across the gleam of the inquisitive candles, with a startled look. Was she going to ask him to give up his inheritance? He was too much surprised to speak.