"Hardly ever, that implies——"
But she breaks in hurriedly, as if dreading—and at the same time doubting her own power of baffling—cross-examination upon that subject on whose borders they are continually hovering.
"Talking of happiness makes one think of unhappiness, does not it? We both know something about that, do not we?"
She pauses, and he sees that she is alluding to his own sorrow, and that her eye is sounding his to see whether he would wish her to approach it more nearly. His eye, in answer, must give but a dubious beam, since he himself is quite unsure of what his wishes on the subject are; and she goes on with the haste and yet unsteadiness of one who is treading on swampy ground, that gives beneath his feet.
"We saw it in the papers; I could not believe it at first. It was the last thing I ever expected to happen. I thought of writing to you, but I did not."
She looks at him rather wistfully, and although but two minutes ago she had been confessing to him her passion for another man, he sees that she is anxious he should tell her that her sympathy would have been precious to him. He feels the same sensation as before of mixed anger and fascination at the ductility of her nature. What business has she to care whether he would have liked to hear from her or not?
"It seemed such a pity that it was she, and not I!"
Again her eye interrogates his, as if asking for acquiescence in this suggestion, but he cannot give it. With a shock of surprise—nay, horror—at himself, he finds that he is unable to echo the wish that Elizabeth had died and Amelia lived.
"I said so to mammy at the time. Ah, here is mammy!"
And, indeed, as she speaks the door opens, and Mrs. Le Marchant enters in her walking-dress. At the sight of Jim, a look, which certainly does not betoken pleasure, though good breeding prevents its representing the opposite emotion, crosses her handsome, worn face.