Mary came out at this moment from the inner room. There was nothing in her of either horror or mystery. Her grey hair was a little disordered, curling in stray locks over the black veil which she had tied upon her head; her complexion quite fresh, with its soft rose-tint unaffected by the night’s vigil; and her eyes full of light. Lady Frogmore had always possessed pretty eyes, they were the chief beauty of her face; not very bright, but always softly shining and luminous. For many years there had been, save on remarkable occasions, a sort of veil over them, a look as if they were turned inward. Now they were fully aglow, lit like two stars with a lambent quivering light. A look of supreme satisfaction and content was upon her face.
“He has taken his drink,” she said, “and gone to sleep again, like a baby. He will probably now have a long, sleep. Sleep is better for him than anything. John, we invaded your house like a couple of thieves, after dark. I had not time to ask for you or anything. I came upstairs at once, knowing I was wanted, and arrived here—just in time.”
“What do you mean by arriving just in time?” said John Parke, with an awful shadow coming over his face.
“I mean,” said Mary with a soft little laugh, “neither too early nor too late—just when I was wanted; and if you ask me how I knew that I was wanted I could not tell you. These things are mysterious. I came just at the moment—”
What moment? There was a curdling in the blood of the spectators but none in Mary. All the horror had died away; she could think of nothing but the opportuneness of her own arrival. Perhaps she had forgotten even what it was which she had stopped “in time.”
After that extraordinary thrill of silence John Parke spoke again in a voice which quivered strangely. “I came to tell you,” he said, “that Letitia is ill.”
“Ah!” said Mary. And she added gravely, “I do not wonder,” with sudden seriousness; but there was nothing more in her gentle countenance; no anger; no fear.
The nurse, who was the least enlightened of all, yet the most eager, the most full of surmises, said with anxiety, yet timidity, “Mrs. Parke has been so anxious. She has taken so much out of herself.”
“Yes, I am afraid she has been very anxious,” said Mary, still with that mild, yet strange seriousness. “It was, perhaps, very natural—in the circumstances.”
“She was afraid lest anything should be neglected, and so anxious for every help that could be thought of—everything that the doctor or we could suggest.”