Miss Anna made him an almost imperceptible sign, in which an anxious desire to keep him silent was mingled with the utmost intolerance of impatience. The young man stopped short suddenly; and Milly, who was the spectator of all, taking no other part, saw vaguely this transaction carried on over their heads, and wondered, though she did not know what it could mean.
But Grace perceived nothing at all: for once her perceptions were dulled; the tears in her eyes blinded her, scalding as they were with indignation, and the quick passionate shame with which so young a creature is apt to feel and resent a humiliating judgment. She continued vehemently, “We are not asking anything—we have money enough; we are rich enough: if that is what you mean.”
“I did not mean to be unkind,” said the stately lady. “Sit down, do not be impatient. Geoffrey, I think we can dispense with your presence. These young ladies will be more at their ease with me alone.”
He had pressed forward, in spite of her prohibition. He was a little like her, though not so handsome; but there was no mistaking the honest sympathy and feeling in his eyes. Both the girls turned to him with a conviction that here at least was a friend. A sort of faint half-smile of recognition passed between them. “Oh, is it you?” said Grace unawares. They seemed in this enchanted house, in this strange audience-chamber, to have encountered at last some one of their own species, some one who would stand by them. They looked at him with an anxious, unspoken entreaty not to go away; and he reassured them by the faintest movement of his head.
“I think,” he said, “it will be better if I stay.”
“I think otherwise,” said Miss Anna; but she said no more to him, and made no further objection. “Sit down,” she said, touching the chair from which Grace had risen, with her stick. “You must not be offended; I meant no harm. I should not have thought any worse of you had you come to me for help, and I don’t think any better of you for being well off. I am sorry for you all the same. But tell me why you came to me. No, wait a little, you can tell me presently. In the meantime, Geoffrey, you can ring for tea.”
He did it without a word, standing before the fire contemplating the group. The girls did not know what it all meant; but gradually it dawned upon them with a strange sensation that they were not the principals here, but that a veiled and hidden conflict was going on between the two strangers, who appeared to share this luxurious home, and who were somehow, they could not tell how, connected with themselves and their concerns. The innocent commonplace request to ring for the tea had, they felt, if they could but understand it, a much more serious meaning than appeared. Geoffrey obeyed, but they felt very grateful to him that he showed no intention of going away.
And then there was a curious pause.
[CHAPTER VII]
OF all innocent domestic entertainments there is none more innocent, not to say tame, than the recent institution which is now so universally popular, of afternoon tea. The virtuous dulness, the gentle talk, is seldom enlivened by any dramatic interest going on under the surface. Now and then, indeed, a mild love affair will give a little excitement to the circle round the tea-table: but this is the utmost stretch to which the imagination can reach as connected with that mild entertainment. And among all the pretty suburban houses, surrounding London with endless circles of comfort and brightness, there could not have been found a more attractive group than that which occupied Miss Anna’s pretty sitting-room in Grove Road. But underneath this innocent seeming how many elements of tragedy were working! Miss Anna’s motive was known to none of them; but, whatever it was, it was strong enough to make her exert herself in a way which startled her nephew and gave him the watchful, suspicious, gloomy air which entirely changed the character of his face. Grace and Milly for their part soon began to feel the strange fascination exercised over them to be intolerable, yet what with their shyness, and strangeness, and bewilderment, suddenly plunged into a scene so new to them, did not know how to break the spell—though Grace became every moment more sensible of the false position, and even felt it a reproach to her in her sorrow to be turned aside out of her serious course by the light and graceful current of Miss Anna’s recollections and anecdotes. Geoffrey, who kept a sort of neutral place between them, was not really aware, save by the instinct which made him divine something wrong underneath the surface, of half the seriousness of the situation. It had not yet occurred to him to identify the dead father of the girls with the visitor who had caused so much commotion in the house some time before. He thought nothing more now than that they had generously come, though in grievous trouble, to convey some information respecting that stranger; and he saw clearly enough that the same motive which had induced his aunt to disown and dismiss the visitor then, was impelling her now to refuse to listen to anything about him.