“Yes,” said Lilias, vacantly—“I mean, wait a little—only wait a little, Helen.”
She had repeated the excuse again and again, and now grasping her friend’s arm with those tightened fingers, she bent her pale head in the full mellow moonlight, and listened, shivering with the chills and starts of expectation.
There was a slight noise below.
“There is some one coming, Helen,” and the trembling fingers tightened in their eager grasp. “It is not Halbert—it must be Mossgray—hush!”
“It is only Janet moving below,” said Helen.
“Hush—listen! it is Mossgray! but I dare not go to meet him. Stay with me, Helen—stay till he comes! Now—now—it will be over now!”
And speaking incoherent words of prayer, Lilias held her eager friend tight, so that she could not escape, and turned her own bowed head towards the door.
Lightly up the stair came the elastic footstep, and Mossgray opened the door gently, and stood before them in the grace of his old age, the moonbeams mingling with his white hair.
“Where are you?” said the old man, looking into the dark shadows of the room. “Helen, is she strong? can she bear joy?”
“Mossgray!”