Into this delicate world of happiness, in which there was nothing real, but all imagination, Lottie was delivered over that bright Sunday. She had no defence against it, and she did not wish to have any. She gave herself up to the dream. After that interval of heaviness, of darkness, when there was no pleasant delusion to support her, and life, with all its difficulties and dangers, became so real, confronting her at every point, what an escape it was for Lottie to find herself again under the dreamy skies of that fool’s paradise! It was the Garden of Eden to her. She thought it was the true world, and the other the false one. The vague terror and disgust with which her father’s new plans filled her mind floated away like a mist; and, as for Law, what so easy as to carry him with her into the better world where she was going? Her mind in a moment was lightened of its load. She had left home heavily; she went back scarcely able to keep from singing in the excess of her light-heartedness, more lifted above earth than if any positive good had come to her. So long as the good is coming, and exists in the imagination only, how much more entrancing is it than anything real that ever can be ours!
The same event, however, which had so much effect upon Lottie acted upon her family too in a manner for which she was far from being prepared. Captain Despard came in as much elated visibly as she was in her heart. There had been but little intercourse among them since the evening when the Captain had made those inquiries about Rollo, which Lottie resented so deeply. The storm had blown over, and she had nominally forgiven Law for going over to the enemy’s side; but Lottie’s heart had been shut even against her brother since that night. He had forsaken her, and she had not been able to pass over his desertion of her cause. However, her heart had softened with her happiness, and she made his tea for him now more genially than she had done for weeks before. They seated themselves round the table with, perhaps, less constraint than usual—a result due to the smiling aspect of the Captain as well as to the softened sentiment in Lottie’s heart. Once upon a time a family tea was a favourite feature in English literature, from Cowper down to Dickens, not to speak of the more exclusively domestic fiction of which it is the chosen banquet. A great deal has been said of this nondescript (and indigestible) meal. But perhaps there must be a drawing of the curtains, a wheeling-in of the sofa, a suggestion of warmth and comfort in contradistinction to storms and chills outside, as in the Opium-eater’s picture of his cottage, to carry out the ideal—circumstances altogether wanting to the tea of the Despards, which was eaten (passez-moi le mot, for is it not the bread-and-butter that makes the meal?) in the warmest hour of an August afternoon. The window, indeed, was open, and the Dean’s Walk, by which the townspeople were coming and going in considerable numbers, as they always did on Sunday, was visible with its gay groups, and the prospect outside was more agreeable than the meal within. Mrs. O’Shaughnessy, next door, had loosed her cap-strings, and fanned herself at intervals as she sipped her tea. “It’s hot, but sure it cools you after,” she was saying to her Major. The Despards, however, were not fat, and did not show the heat like their neighbours. Law sat at the table and pegged away resolutely at his bread-and-butter, having nothing to take his mind off his food, and no very exciting prospect of supper to sustain him. But the Captain took his tea daintily, as one who had heard of a roast fowl and sausages to be ready by nine o’clock, and was, therefore, more or less indifferent to the bread-and-butter. He patted Lottie on the shoulder as she gave him his tea.
“My child,” he said, “I was wrong the other day. It is not every man that would own it so frankly; but I have always been a candid man, though it has damaged me often. When I am in the wrong I am bound to confess it. Take my hand, Lottie, my love. I made a mistake.”
Lottie looked at him surprised. He had taken her hand and held it, shaking it, half-playfully, in his own.
“My love,” he said, “you are not so candid as your poor father. You will get on all the better in the world. I withdraw everything I said, Lottie. All is going well; all is for the best. I make no doubt you can manage your own affairs a great deal better than I.”
“What is it you mean, papa?”
“We will say no more, my child. I give you free command over yourself. That was a fine anthem this afternoon, and I have no doubt those were well repaid who came from a distance to hear it. Don’t you think so, Lottie? Many people come from a great distance to hear the service in the Abbey, and no doubt the Signor made it known that there was to be such a good anthem to-day.”
Lottie did not make any reply. She looked at him with mingled wonder and impatience. What did he mean? It had not occurred to her to connect Rollo with the anthem, but she perceived by the look on her father’s face that something which would be displeasing to her was in his mind.
“What’s the row?” said Law. “Who was there? I thought it was always the same old lot.”
“And so it is generally the same old lot. We don’t vary; but when pretty girls like Lottie say their prayers regularly heaven sends somebody to hear them. Oh, yes; there is always somebody sent to hear them. But you are quite right to allow nothing to be said about it, my child,” said the Captain. “Not a word, on the honour of a gentleman. Your feelings shall be respected. But it may be a comfort to you, my love, to feel that whatever happens your father is behind you, Lottie—knows and approves. My dear, I say no more.”