The father coughs again, at this, and turns his gaze upon the fire, which he contemplates deeply, to the exclusion of all other objects. The girl, after regarding him for a moment, sighs profoundly; placing her elbows on the keyboard, she leans forward and buries her face in her hands.
This picture, not disturbed by further speech, abides for several ticks of the French clock on the mantelpiece. Suddenly it is broken by a knock at the door. Florence sits upright, and dries her eyes. A negro man servant with a discreet manner enters and announces two visitors. “Show them in at once,” says Florence, quickly, as if to forestall any possible objection from her father. The negro withdraws, and presently, with a rapid swish of skirts, in marches a very spick and span young lady, her diminutive but exceedingly trim figure dressed like an animated fashion-plate. She is Miss Edna Hill, and she comes brisk and dashing, with cheeks afire from the cold, bringing into the dull, dreamy room the life and freshness of the wintry day without. Behind her appears a stranger, whose name Florence scarcely heeded when it was announced, and who enters with the solemn, hesitant air of one hitherto unknown to the people of the house. He is a young man clothed to be the fit companion of Miss Hill, and he waits self-effacingly while that young lady vivaciously greets Florence as her dearest, and while she bestows a touch of her gloved fingers and a “How d'ye do, Mr. Kenby,” on the father. She then introduces the young man as Mr. Larcher, on whose face, as he bows, there appears a surprised admiration of Florence Kenby's beauty.
Miss Hill monopolizes Florence, however, and Larcher is left to wander to the fire, and take a pose there, and discuss the weather with Mr. Kenby, who does not seem to find the subject, or Larcher himself, at all interesting, a fact which the young man is not slow in divining. Strained relations immediately ensue between the two gentlemen.
As soon as the young ladies are over the preliminary burst of compliments and news, Edna says:
“I'm lucky to find you at home, but really you oughtn't to be moping in a dark place like this, such a fine afternoon.”
“Father can't go out because of his rheumatism, and I stay to keep him company,” replies Florence.
“Oh, dear me, Mr. Kenby,” says Edna, looking at the gentleman rather skeptically, as if she knew him of old and suspected a habit of exaggerating his ailments, “can't you pass the time reading or something? Florence must go out every day; she'll ruin her looks if she doesn't,—her health, too. I should think you could manage to entertain yourself alone an hour or two.”
“It isn't that,” explains Florence; “he often wants little things done, and it's painful for him to move about. In a house like this, the servants aren't always available, except for routine duties.”
“Well, I'll tell you what,” proposes Edna, blithely; “you get on your things, dear, and we'll run around and have tea with Aunt Clara at Purcell's. Mr. Larcher and I were to meet her there, but you come with me, and Mr. Larcher will stay and look after your father. He'll be very glad to, I know.”
Mr. Larcher is too much taken by surprise to be able to say how very glad he will be. Mr. Kenby, with Miss Hill's sharp glance upon him, seems to feel that he would cut a poor figure by opposing. So Florence is rushed by her friend's impetuosity into coat and hat, and carried off, Miss Hill promising to return with her for Mr. Larcher “in an hour or two.” Before Mr. Larcher has had time to collect his scattered faculties, he is alone with the pettish-looking old man to whom he has felt himself an object of perfect indifference. He glares, with a defiant sense of his own worth, at the old man, until the old man takes notice of his existence.