“I think,” said Gussy, “it might have made more impression upon my nerves than upon Janet’s.”
“Oh, please don’t think of my nerves,” said Janet. “If you will let me, I will pour out the tea.”
Meredith said nothing. He was following out, with his brain still a little confused, the clue he had got hold of. It was Janet, certainly it was Janet. He read it in every line of her stiffened figure and conscious countenance, and in the overwhelming agitation which had at last triumphed over her self-control. Yes, he had met her in the library, and it was with her he had walked towards the ambush laid for him. What more? Was there anything more? He had in his mind a vague reminiscence of something else which he had seen, which a little more thinking would perhaps enable him to master. She must have seen what happened if it was she who was with him, as he believed. She must be aware, if not who it was that had assaulted him, at least how it was. He kept on thinking while they talked round him, trying to quicken his own feeble brain into action, and saying to himself that she must know. If she knew, why was she silent? Then it occurred to Meredith what the reason was.
He glanced at Gussy, sitting by him, and even upon his face there came a certain uneasy color. Betray to Gussy his rendezvous with Janet! Ah, he understood now why Janet did not speak. She dared not. She must have stolen indoors somehow, and concealed the fact that she had ever been out. It would be her ruin to make her confess. Perhaps Meredith would not have cared so very much for this, if it had not appeared to him that he himself would cut but an indifferent figure—paying his addresses to the daughter of the house, and intriguing with the governess? He went over the same ground which Janet had already traversed, and he confessed to himself that it would not do. But what was this consciousness in his mind that he knew, or had known something more?
“Bring Charley his tea, Dolff,” said Mrs. Harwood. “I am sure he wants his tea. It is a nice habit for a man, which I hope you will keep up, Charley, when you are well. I always like to see a young man find pleasure in his tea.”
Her soft voice ran on while Dolff very unwillingly, and with averted face, carried the tea to Meredith. What was it that this dark, stormy, half-averted face suggested to the sick man? Dolff leaned over him for a moment, very unwillingly holding out the tea to him, offering him cake and bread-and-butter, which simple dainties were now part of the invalid’s regimen. Meredith caught that view of Dolff’s face with a certain shock, with a quickened interest, almost anxiety. What did it mean? There was something which he recollected, which he could not recollect—some fact that might throw light upon everything. He was startled beyond measure by the sight of Dolff’s face Dolff! there could be nothing in him to excite anyone. Why was it that his heart began to beat at the sight of Dolff? He could not make it out—it had something to do with his accident. What was it. But presently Meredith felt his head begin to ache and his brain to swim. He leaned back upon his pillows with a sigh of impatience. Gussy was standing by his side in a moment asking,
“Was he tired—did he feel giddy?”
Meredith answered with a disappointment and petulance, which in his weak state nearly moved him to tears,
“I can’t think, that is the worst of it. I begin to remember a trifle here and there. I have got the length of remembering who was with me, and I know there is something more.”
“Don’t try to think any more—leave it till to-morrow. You know,” said Gussy, “dear Charley, the doctors say it will come all right; but you must do it justice, and not force it. There is no hurry, is there? You are not obliged to begin working directly again.”