'Finely,' Tommy answered. 'I am obliged to you.' And when they had jointly loosened his lordship's cravat, and removed his wig and set the cool jug of small beer within his reach, Mr. Pomeroy bade the other a curt good-night, and took himself off.
Mr. Thomasson waited until his footsteps ceased to echo in the gallery, and then, he scarcely knew why, he furtively opened the door and peeped out. All was dark; and save for the regular tick of the pendulum on the stairs, the house was still. Mr. Thomasson, wondering which way Julia's room lay, stood listening until a stair creaked; and then, retiring precipitately, locked his door. Lord Almeric, in the gloom of the green moreen curtains that draped his huge four-poster, had fallen into a drunken slumber. The shadow of his wig, which Pomeroy had clapped on the wig-stand by the bed, nodded on the wall, as the draught moved the tails. Mr. Thomasson shivered, and, removing the candle--as was his prudent habit of nights--to the hearth, muttered that a goose was walking over his grave, undressed quickly, and jumped into bed.
CHAPTER XXV
LORD ALMERIC'S SUIT
When Julia awoke in the morning, without start or shock, to the dreary consciousness of all she had lost, she was still under the influence of the despair which had settled on her spirits overnight, and had run like a dark stain through her troubled dreams. Fatigue of body and lassitude of mind, the natural consequences of the passion and excitement of her adventure, combined to deaden her faculties. She rose aching in all her limbs--yet most at heart--and wearily dressed herself; but neither saw nor heeded the objects round her. The room to which poor puzzled Mrs. Olney had hastily consigned her looked over a sunny stretch of park, sprinkled with gnarled thorn-trees that poorly filled the places of the oaks and chestnuts which the gaming-table had consumed. Still, the outlook pleased the eye, nor was the chamber itself lacking in liveliness. The panels on the walls, wherein needlework cockatoos and flamingoes, wrought under Queen Anne, strutted in the care of needlework black-boys, were faded and dull; but the pleasant white dimity with which the bed was hung relieved and lightened them.
To Julia it was all one. Wrapped in bitter thoughts and reminiscences, her bosom heaving from time to time with ill-restrained grief, she gave no thought to such things, or even to her position, until Mrs. Olney appeared and informed her that breakfast awaited her in another room.
Then, 'Can I not take it here?' she asked, shrinking painfully from the prospect of meeting any one.
'Here?' Mrs. Olney repeated. The housekeeper never closed her mouth, except when she spoke; for which reason, perhaps, her face faithfully mirrored the weakness of her mind.
'Yes,' said Julia. 'Can I not take it here, if you please? I suppose--we shall have to start by-and-by?' she added, shivering.