CHAPTER V
On the Monday morning Francis Eversleigh did not appear at breakfast.
Mrs. Eversleigh told Ernest that his father was asleep after having passed a wakeful night, and she was sure he would not feel equal to going to the office. When Ernest inquired, as was natural, if she intended sending for a doctor, she replied that a suggestion she had made in the night to that effect had been peremptorily negatived by her husband, who maintained that he was suffering from a slight attack for which it was absurd to call in a physician.
"I am very anxious, however, about him," she said. She paused and looked meditatively at her son. "Do you know, Ernest," she continued, "if your father has on hand some exceptionally difficult business just now, or if there is some client who is giving him cause for unusual anxiety?" She was thinking of Bennet.
"I am quite certain there is absolutely nothing of such gravity as to make him ill," replied Ernest, with conviction. "Why, work goes on at the office from day to day and from month to month with the ease and regularity of machinery. But why do you ask this, mother?"
"Because it has occurred to me that there is something on your father's mind, and it is that which is making him ill."
"Indeed! Oh, I think you must be mistaken, mother."
"I hope so," she rejoined, but not in a really hopeful tone. "One of the things which perplex me is that he seems to take very little pleasure in the engagement of Kitty and Gilbert—that is strange, is it not? Then again, you would suppose he would be looking forward with interest to seeing his old friend Morris Thornton once more, yet, when I referred to it, he spoke in such a queer way. I can't understand him at all."
As Ernest was about to speak Miss Kitty Thornton entered the room, and conversation passed to other topics. And as for Kitty herself, her brilliant beauty appeared to have been enhanced by the happy event of her engagement, for never had she looked so lovely as she did that morning, and there was on her face a light of happiness which was good to see.