The carriage at the door. Rollo threw himself off his horse and went in. He was too late. Just within the door he met the little lady he came to see, standing in her pretty draperies of mantle and veil, ready for her drive; and Mr. Falkirk was behind her.
'O Mr. Rollo!' she said (fortified with this last fact) 'you have come for lunch!'
'Have I?' said he, as he took her hand in the old-fashioned way. 'I see I shall not get it.'
'Will getting it to-morrow help you to dispense with it to-day? We are engaged at Mrs. Powder's. You see I must go.'
'I see you must go. I have been delayed.'
Mr. Falkirk, according to his accustomed tactics, passed out upon the veranda after giving his own greeting, leaving the others alone. Rollo had come with a face flushed with pleasure and riding; now a certain shade fell upon it; his brow grew grave, as if with sudden thought.
'I will not detain you,' he said, after seeing that Mr. Falkirk was at a safe distance; 'only let me ask one question. Arthur Maryland says he saw you waltzing with that English Crofton. I know it is not true; but tell me so, that I may contradict him. He was mistaken.'
'Dr. Arthur! was he there?' voice and face too shewed a sudden check.
'But he did not see that?' said Rollo, with eyes which seemed as if they would deny the fact by sheer force of will.
Her eyes had no more than glanced at him hitherto, shyly withholding themselves. But now they looked full into his face, using the old, wistful, girlish right of search; watching him as keenly as sometimes he watched her. She answered gravely: