And then there came a pause; for Miss Susan, at her wits’ end, did not know what to say. The child lay with one little foot kicked out at full length, the other dimpled knee bent, his little face flushed in the firelight, fast asleep at their feet; the wet shawl in which he had been wrapped steaming and smoking in the heat; and the tall, fine figure of the young woman, slim and graceful, thrown back in the easy-chair in absolute repose and comfort. Though Miss Susan stood on her own hearth, and these two were intruders, aliens, it was she who hesitated and trembled, and the other who was calm and full of easy good-humor. She lay back in her chair as if she had lived there all her life; she stretched herself out before the welcome fire; she smiled upon the mistress of the house with benign indifference. “You would not separate the mother and the child,” she repeated. “That would be worse than to separate husband and wife.”
Miss Susan wrung her hands in despair. “For a little while I shall be—glad to have you,” she said, putting force on herself; “for a—week or two—a fortnight. But for a longer time I cannot promise. I am going to leave this house.”
“One house is like another to me,” said the stranger. “I will go with you where you go. You will be good to me and the child.”
Poor Miss Susan! This second Ruth looked at her dismay unmoved, nay, with a certain air of half humorous amusement. She was not afraid of her, nor of being turned away. She held possession with the bold security of one who, she knows, cannot be rejected. “I shall not be dull or fatigued of you, for you will be kind; and where you go I will go,” she repeated, in Ruth’s very words; while Miss Susan’s heart sank, sank into the very depths of despair. What could she do or say? Should she give up her resistance for the moment, and wait to see what time would bring forth? or should she, however difficult it was, stand out now at the beginning, and turn away the unwelcome visitor? At that moment, however, while she tried to make up her mind to the severest measures, a blast of rain came against the window, and moaned and groaned in the chimneys of the old house. To turn a woman and a child out into such a night was impossible; they must stay at least till morning, whatever they did more.
“And I should like something to eat,” said the stranger, stretching her arms above her head with natural but not elegant freedom, and distorting her beautiful face with a great yawn. “I am very fatigued; and then I should like to wash myself and rest.”
“Perhaps it is too late to do anything else to-night,” said Miss Susan, with a troubled countenance; “to-morrow we must talk further; and I think you will see that it will be better to go back where you are known—among your friends—”
“No, no; never go back!” she cried. “I will go where you go; that is, I will not change any more. I will stay with you—and the child.”
Miss Susan rang the bell with an agitated hand, which conveyed strange tremors even to the sound of the bell, and let the kitchen, if not into her secret, at least into the knowledge that there was a secret, and something mysterious going on. Martha ran to answer the summons, pushing old Stevens out of the way. “If it’s anything particular, it’s me as my lady wants,” Martha said, moved to double zeal by curiosity; and a more curious scene had never been seen by wondering eyes of domestic at Whiteladies than that which Martha saw. The stranger lying back in her chair, yawning and stretching her arms; Miss Susan standing opposite, with black care upon her brow; and at their feet between them, roasting, as Martha said, in front of the fire, the rosy baby with its odd dress, thrown down like a bundle on the rug. Martha gave a scream at sight of the child. “Lord! it’s a baby! and summun will tread on’t!” she cried, with her eyes starting out of her head.
“Hold your tongue, you foolish woman,” cried Miss Susan; “do you think I will tread on the child? It is sleeping, poor little thing. Go at once, and make ready the East room; light a fire, and make everything comfortable. This—lady—is going to stay all night.”
“Yes—every night,” interposed the visitor, with a smile.