The answer was a quick motion of Fleda's hand to her head, speaking sudden pain, and perhaps sudden difficulty of self- command. She did not speak.
"Will you have anything?"
A whispered "No."
"Would you like to return to Mrs. Evelyn's? I have a carriage here."
With a look of relief that seemed to welcome him as her good angel, Fleda instantly rose up, and took the arm he offered her. She would have hastened from the room then, but he gently checked her pace; and Fleda was immediately grateful for the quiet and perfect shielding from observation that his manner secured her. He went with her up the stairs, and to the very door of the dressing-room. There Fleda hurried on her shoes and mufflers in trembling fear that some one might come and find her, gained Mr. Carleton's arm again, and was placed in the carriage.
The drive was in perfect silence, and Fleda's agony deepened and strengthened with every minute. She had freedom to think, and thought did but carry a torch into chamber after chamber of misery. There seemed nothing to be done. She could not get hold of Charlton; and if she could? Nothing could be less amenable than his passions to her gentle restraints. Mr. Thorn was still less approachable or manageable, except in one way that she did not even think of. His insinuations about Mr. Carleton did not leave even a tinge of embarrassment upon her mind; they were cast from her as insulting absurdities, which she could not think of a second time without shame.
The carriage rolled on with them a long time without a word being said. Mr. Carleton knew that she was not weeping nor faint. But as the light of the lamps was now and then cast within the carriage, he saw that her face looked ghastly; and he saw too, that its expression was not of a quiet sinking under sorrow, nor of an endeavour to bear up against it, but a wild searching gaze into the darkness of possibilities. They had near reached Mrs. Evelyn's.
"I cannot see you so," he said, gently touching the hand which lay listlessly beside him. "You are ill!"
Again the same motion of the other hand to her face, the quick token of great pain suddenly stirred.
"For the sake of old times, let me ask," said he "can nothing be done?"