‘Am I looking miserable? You can’t see me, my darling,’ said her mother with a faint laugh. She added, after a pause: ‘Mrs. Bircham has got a new story against one of her neighbours. Don’t let us pay any attention, Emmy; I never do, you know.’
‘No, mamma,’ said Emmy, with a quaver in her voice. She was very quiet and said very little, but in her half-invalid condition she could not help observing a great many things that eluded other people, and many alarms and doubts and suppressed suspicions were in her mind which she could not and would not have put in words. There was something in the semi-darkness and in the abandon in which she had found her mother which encouraged Emmy. She clasped Mrs. Blencarrow’s arm in both of hers, and put her face against her mother’s dress.
‘Oh, mamma,’ she said, ‘if you are troubled about anything, won’t you tell me? Oh, mamma, tell me! I should be less unhappy if I knew.’
‘Are you unhappy, Emmy?—about me?’
‘Oh! I did not mean quite that; but you are unhappy sometimes, and how can I help seeing it? I know your every look, and what you mean when you put your hands together—like that, mamma.’
‘Do you, Emmy?’ The mother took her child into her arms with a strong pressure, as if Emmy’s feeble innocence pressed against her own strong, struggling bosom did her good. The girl felt the quiver in her mother’s arm, which enfolded her, and felt the heavy beating of the heart against which she was pressed, with awe and painful sympathy, but without suspicion. She knew everything without knowing anything in her boundless sympathy and love. But just then the clock upon the mantelpiece tingled out its silvery chime. Five o’clock! Mrs. Blencarrow put Emmy out of her arms with a sudden start. ‘I did not think it was so late. I have to see some one downstairs at five o’clock.’
‘Oh, mamma, wait for some tea; it is just coming.’
‘You are very late,’ said Mrs. Blencarrow to the butler, who came in carrying a lamp, while John followed him with the tray. Tea in the afternoon was a very novel invention, at that time known only in a few houses. ‘Do not be so late another day. I must go, Emmy—it is business; but I shall be back almost directly.’
‘Oh, mamma, I hate business; you say you will be back directly, and you don’t come for hours!’
Mrs. Blencarrow kissed her daughter and smiled at her, patting her on the shoulder.