There was a pause. He never could have thought he would have felt so anxious, or that his heart would have beaten as it was beating. Through the twilight he could see Lucy’s serious eyes—not stars, or anything superfluous—honest, tranquil, with a little curve of thought over each brow, looking at him. She was anxious too. At last she said, with a soft sigh, “I wish, I wish I knew—”
“What Lucy?”
“What is right,” she said, with a little hurrying and faltering of the words, “what papa would have liked. It is so hard to tell. He left me a great many instructions for different things, but not a word, not a word about this.”
“In this, you may be sure, he wished your heart to be your guide,” said Sir Thomas, “and so, even if you decide against me, do I—”
“How could I decide against you, Sir Tom?” she said, with a soft reproach. “I am thinking, only thinking, what is right.”
What was Sir Thomas to do? he began to feel that his position was almost ludicrous, sitting here, suspended upon Lucy’s breath, waiting for her answer. This was not the triumphant position which he had occupied ten minutes ago, when he felt himself to be the deliverer, coming with acclamations to set everything right. Whether to be very angry and annoyed, or to laugh at this curious turning of the tables—to be patient and wait her pleasure, or to betray the half-provoked, half-amused impatience he began to feel—he did not know.
The matter was decided in a way as unlooked for as was the crisis itself. Suddenly, without any warning, the door bounced open, and Mrs. Ford stood in the door-way, in a dark vacancy, which showed her darker substance like a drawing in sepia. “Lucy,” she said solemnly, “do you mean to starve yourself to death, all to spite me? I have not had a moment’s peace all day since you went out without your dinner. Sir Thomas Randolph, if you have got any influence with her, make her come down to her tea.”
“I will, Mrs. Ford,” he said.
“There’s a roast partridge,” said Mrs. Ford, with real emotion. “Jock, bless him, has eat up the other. Oh, Lucy, if you do not want to make me wretched, come down to your tea!”
“I am coming,” said Lucy. She rose up, and so did her companion— Mrs. Ford in the door-way looking on, not seeing anything but the two shadows, yet wondering and troubled in her mind to think of the neglect which had left them there without any lights. “I will give it to that Lizzie,” said Mrs. Ford internally; but there was something in the air which she did not understand, which kept her silent in spite of herself.