'I have never met any one half as good as Uncle Max,' was my warm retort. 'He is the most unselfish of men.'
'Unselfish men make mistakes sometimes,' she returned drily. 'Giles and he are great friends. He is up at Gladwyn a great deal; so is Mr. Tudor. Mr. Tudor is not a finished character, but he has good points, and one can tolerate him. There, how vexing, we were just beginning to talk comfortably, and I see the shadow of her majesty's gown at the gate. Come, Nap, we must fly to Mrs. Barton's for refuge. Au revoir, Miss Garston.' And, kissing her little gloved hand, this strangest of Lady Betties vanished, followed by the obedient Nap.
My pulses quickened a little at the prospect of seeing the beautiful face of Gladys Hamilton in my little room; but it was not she who entered first, but Miss Darrell, whose sharp incisive glance had taken in every detail of my surroundings before her faultlessly-gloved hand had released mine; and even when I turned to greet Miss Hamilton, her peculiar and somewhat toneless voice claimed my attention.
'How very fortunate,' she began, seating herself with elaborate caution with her back to the light. 'We hardly hoped to find you at home, Miss Garston. My cousin Giles informed us how much engaged you were. We have been so interested in what Mr. Cunliffe told us about it. It is such a romantic scheme, and, as I am a very romantic person, you may be sure of my sympathy. Gladys, dear, is this not a charming room? Positively you have so altered and beautified it that I can hardly believe it is the same room. I told a friend of ours, Mrs. Saunders, that it would never suit her, as it was such a shabby little place.'
'It is very nice,' returned Miss Hamilton quietly. 'I hope,' fixing her large, beautiful eyes on me, 'that you are comfortable here? We thought perhaps you might be a little dull.'
'I have no time to be dull,' I returned, smiling, but Miss Darrell interrupted me.
'No, of course not; busy people are never dull. I told you so, Gladys, as we walked up the road. Depend upon it, I said, Miss Garston will hardly have a minute to give to our idle chatter. She will be wanting to get to her sick people, and wish us at Hanover. Still, as my cousin Giles said, we must do the right thing and call, though I am sure you are not a conventional person; neither am I. Oh, we are quite kindred souls here.'
I tried to receive this speech in good part, but I certainly protested inwardly against the notion that Miss Darrell and I would ever be kindred souls. I felt an instinctive repugnance to her voice; its want of tone jarred on me; and all the time she talked, her hard, bright eyes seemed to dart restlessly from Miss Hamilton to me. I felt sure that nothing could escape their scrutiny; but now and then, when one looked at her in return, she seemed to veil them most curiously under the long curling lashes.
She was rather an elegant-looking woman, but her face was decidedly plain. She had thin lips and rather a square jaw, and her sallow complexion lacked colour. One could not guess her age exactly, but she might have been three-or four-and-thirty. I heard her spoken of afterwards as a very interesting-looking person; certainly her figure was fine, and she knew how to dress herself,—a very useful art when women have no claim to beauty.
Miss Darrell's voluble tongue seemed to touch on every subject. Miss Hamilton sat perfectly silent, and I had not a chance of addressing her. Once, when I looked at her, I could see her eyes were fixed on my darling's picture. She was gazing at it with an air of absorbed melancholy: her lips were firmly closed, and her hands lay folded in her lap.