Queenie was cheering herself up in sturdy fashion, but she turned a little pale, nevertheless, when the servant re-entered and bade her follow him. "The execution will soon be over," she said to herself, as she rose; "only in my case perhaps the pain will not cease."
They had passed through the large square hall, dimly lighted from above, and had turned down a side-passage shut in with red baize doors; through one of these was an inner one, which the servant threw open, and Queenie found herself in a small room, furnished as a library, with a bright fire burning in a steel grate, and a cushioned chair beside it with a foot-rest, wherein sat a tall, thin old man, whom she at once recognized as Mr. Calcott. There was an instant's silence as she bowed and threw back her veil, during which he eyed her morosely, and pointed to his foot swathed in bandages.
"I cannot rise, you see," he said, in a harsh voice that somewhat grated on her ear, "neither can I keep a lady standing; please to be seated, while you tell me to what I am indebted for the pleasure of this interview; my servant says you declined to give him your name."
"I had reasons for doing so. I feared you might not see me," returned Queenie, summoning all her resolution now the opportunity was gained. The hard mouth, the narrow, receding forehead, and the cold, gray eyes of the man before her stifled every dawning hope. Would those eyes soften? could those lines ever relax? He was an old man, older than she had thought, and there were traces of acute physical suffering in his face, but the hard tension of the muscles were terrible.
"Would you have seen me," she continued, steadily, "if I had said my name was Marriott?"
"So you are Frank Marriott's daughter," without the faintest token of surprise. "I must own I suspected as much from Gurnel's description; but I am slightly at a loss to discover what business Frank Marriott's daughter can possibly have with me."
"I have come on no business of my own," returned the girl, proudly. "I ask nothing from the world but the price of my own earnings. I would sooner starve"—with a sudden flush of irrepressible emotion—"than ask a favor from a stranger, even though he were the brother of my own dear stepmother. It is for Emmie's sake I have come to you, Mr. Calcott; Emmie, your own niece, your own flesh and blood, your sister's child."
"I have always expected this," muttered Mr. Calcott, as he refreshed himself with a pinch of highly-scented snuff; but a closer observer of human nature than Queenie would have detected a slight trembling in the white wrinkled hand.
"When my dear stepmother, your sister, died," continued Queenie, speaking more calmly now, "she called me to her bed-side, and prayed me, for love of her, to watch over Emmie. I have kept my promise, and have done so; but I am only young, not much more than twenty, and I have no one to help me, no one but Mr. Runciman, who is so good to us, to give me advice and counsel; and now I feel that I cannot do my duty to Emmie."
"Your conduct has been estimable, no doubt; but you must permit me to observe, my dear young lady, that I have not invited this confidence; on the contrary, it is distasteful to me. But doubtless you are only acting on Mr. Runciman's advice?"