"My dear child," returned Marcus, rather impatiently, "am I likely to lose sight of him when I am at the Models at least three times a week?"
"No, but we can see him so much better under our own roof," she replied, quietly. "We must not get tired of him too soon. Yes, you are tired, dear," laying her hand affectionately on his. "Do you think I do not know that, although you are so good about it, and never grumble, but it will be trying to us both when he comes downstairs."
"Yes, and one hardly knows how to treat him," returned Marcus, feeling it a relief to utter his thoughts. "He is clever and refined, and I suppose we must allow that he is a gentleman, but it is impossible somehow to trust him, or to feel at one's ease with him. There is something that fascinates and yet repels one."
"I know what you mean," replied Olivia, thoughtfully, "but somehow I like him in spite of everything; Marcus, what a blessing it is to think that I went to Galvaston House this afternoon, and so I shall be free to-morrow," for Olivia's sunny, nature always looked on the bright side of things.
That night a wonderful thing happened. The night-bell rang.
That sound so dreaded by the hard-worked doctor was like a triumphal reveille in Marcus's ears. And Robert Barton's muttered "poor devil" as he turned on his pillow would not have been endorsed.
Olivia indeed had been alarmed for a moment by the unaccustomed sound, and thought drowsily that the house must be on fire, but she was soon wide awake and hushing Dot.
"Go to sleep, girlie, it is only someone come to see dada," she said, rocking her little one. Dot had been startled and was cross in consequence, and it was sometime before she could be pacified.
The next minute Marcus came back fully dressed. "I must go round to 15, Brunswick Place," he said, hurriedly. "Don't expect me back till you see me," and then she heard him running downstairs.
"He expects to be detained, so I suppose some poor baby is to enter this wintry world," she thought, as she composed herself to sleep, but she little guessed the terribly hard work that was before Marcus.