“Innocent!” said Longueville, starting up. “You idiot, why did not you tell me? Where have you put her?” and with a haste and anxiety which put all thought of a grin out of his attendant’s head, Sir Alexis rushed out, thrusting away the man, whose mind changed on the subject in the twinkling of an eye.
CHAPTER XXXIX.
AN APPEAL.
“Innocent! you here, and alone—where are the others?” cried Sir Alexis, taking both her hands.
“I have come—because I promised,” said Innocent—“no one knows. You were to help me if I wanted help; I have come—for that. If I ever wanted to go away—to have some one to help me—that was what you said.—Surely you recollect?”
“Recollect! yes, I recollect,” he said, in agitation and dismay, and led her to a seat. He looked at her with a wonder which words could not express, and with a troubled sense of his accountability for having made such a promise which had never occurred to him at the moment it was made. To have her here in his house, all alone, was an indecorum which struck the old man of the world as it never would have struck Innocent. “My dear child, tell me what it is—I will walk home with you,” he said in his confusion, not knowing what other suggestion to make.
“But I do not want to go home,” said Innocent. “I came to you to help me. I have a great deal to tell you; but if they see me they will take me back, they will not understand. Oh, keep me here!—help me as you said——”
“Innocent! you bewilder me. What has happened—what can I do? But, whatever I can do, my dear child, it will be better for you to be at home.”
“I do not think so,” she said; “and I have been thinking a great deal—I have been very unhappy—there is a great deal, a very great deal to tell you. But for thinking of you, I do not know what I should have done. It was because you said so yourself that I have come——”
“Yes, I did say so,” he murmured in his confusion. He was confused, but she was perfectly calm; her eyes met his with their childish look of appeal; no consciousness, no embarrassment, nothing in them that was not simple as her soul. The man’s heart was touched beyond expression. “Yes, my dear,” he said, “I did say so—and this house is yours, and everything in it. You shall stay if you will—you shall do with it as you please. I am grieved—grieved to the heart that you should be unhappy. Have confidence in me—I will do everything for you that I could do for—my own child.”
“Thanks,” she said gently, “you were always kind;” and then seemed to fall into a half-reverie—a dreamy, self-absorbed pause. “I have so much to tell you,” she resumed, “I don’t know where to begin——”