“Oh, Nello, don’t you think God will help him?” she said, one tear overbrimming suddenly, and rolling down her cheek. She started when Mary, with tones a little sharpened by consternation, called her. Lilias had no sense of shame in her innocent mind, but as there is no telling in what light those curious beings called grown-up people might regard a child’s actions, a little thrill of alarm went through her. What might Mary say? What would she think when she knew that Mr. Geoff “had come to set everything right about papa”? Lilias felt instinctively that Geoff’s mission would not appear in exactly the same light to Mary as it did to herself. She turned round with a sudden flush of surprise and agitation on her face. It looked like the blush of a maturer sentiment to Mary.
“At twelve years old!” she said to herself! And unconsciously there glanced through her mind a recollection of the first Lily—the child’s mother—she who had been the beginning of all the trouble. Was it in the blood?
“Who is that gentleman?” Mary asked, with much disturbance of mind. “Lilias! I could not have expected this of you.”
Lilias followed into the hall, very still and pale, feeling herself a culprit, though she did not know why. Her hands dropped straight by her side, after the manner of a creature accused; and she looked up to Mary with eyes full of vague alarm, into which the tears were ready to come at a moment’s notice.
“I have not done anything wrong?” she said, turning her assertion into a faltering question. “It was Mr. Geoff.”
“Mr. Geoff!—who is Mr. Geoff?”
“He is—very kind—oh, very kind, Mary; he is—some one who knows about papa: he is—the gentleman who once came with two beautiful horses in a carriage (oh, don’t you remember, Nello?) to see you.”
“Yes,” said Nello, with ready testimony; “he said I should ride upon them. They were two bay horses, in one of those high-up funny carriages, not like Mary’s carriage. I wonder if I might ride upon his horse now?”
“To see me?” Mary was entirely bewildered. “And what do you mean about your father?” she said. “Knows about papa! Lilias! come here; I am not angry. What does he know about papa?”
Lilias came up slowly to her side, half unwilling to communicate her own knowledge on this point. For Mary had not told her the secret, she remembered suddenly. But the confusion of Lilias was interrupted by something more startling and agitating. Eastwood came into the hall, with a certain importance and solemnity. “If you please, ma’am,” he said, “my Lord Stanton has just come in, and I’ve shown him into the library—to my master. I thought you would like to know.”