"Loyd!" she added faintly; "it is Loyd you wish to marry?"
"Whom else?" answered Romaine, smiling calmly; "you would not doubt it, mother dear, if you knew all. Oh, I am not demented, as perhaps you think. I am myself again, thanks to the magnetism of his great love. Mother, if I thought that he were never to have the right in the sight of God and man to call me wife, I should pray for death—ay, court it as the sweetest boon. Thwart me in my love, and you kill me; grant my prayer, and you not only give me life, but heaven upon earth!"
It cannot be said that Mrs. Effingham was wholly unprepared for the turn affairs had taken. Setting aside Hubert's expressed suspicions, her woman's instinct had vaguely warned her how this inexplicable course of love had raised Morton upon its bosom, leaving Drummond high and dry, stranded upon the stale and unprofitable shore of Neglect. And yet, out of sheer loyalty to Drummond and his interests, she had refused to listen to that mysterious voice, stiller and smaller than the voice of conscience. She had waited to be convinced by some ulterior medium which, after all, she knew could but accord with her own unacknowledged convictions.
From her son next day she received but cold comfort, though it was gently offered, according to his wont.
"I told you so," he remarked. "For Colley's sake, I have done what I could, only to be met by dismal failure. I will never venture to risk so much again. We must accept the inevitable, dear mother, and make the best of a situation which, if inexplicable, is far from desperate. I can only say, God grant that Romaine's determined action may not prove to be some insane caprice!"
"Amen to that!" came the faltering reply.
The lady's first interview with Morton after the revelation was managed in more diplomatic fashion.
She met the young physician in the garden before breakfast on the following morning. She kissed him in silence, and held his hands while the unbidden tears welled within her haggard eyes.
"Romaine has spoken!" he exclaimed, interpreting the mute eloquence of her attitude.
She bowed her head in assent.