I took the sweet face between my hands, and looked into the clear eyes, which did not flinch under my gaze, as she added in a low voice: 'I am not in love with another woman's husband, Mary.'
No; I came to the happy conclusion that she was not. There was no cause for further anxiety upon that score. Had I only been right in my fancy about Robert Wentworth, how pleasantly might things now have arranged themselves!
Again I felt obliged to postpone telling Lilian about my coming happiness. It had seemed difficult to talk of my engagement the night before, how much more so now—on Arthur Trafford's wedding-day. I must still wait for a more fitting season, I told myself.
Mrs Tipper had done her best to make the little parlour appear as cheerful and home-like as possible; and I saw that she watched Lilian with loving anxiety. She had prepared quite a feast for our favourite meal that day. If hot cakes and everything else the dear little woman could think of in the way of dainties had been remedies for disappointed love, Lilian might have owed her recovery to them, so plentifully were they provided. She had the comfort of seeing her niece partake of the good things with an appetite which quite set her mind at rest.
If it really cost Lilian something so to gratify her aunt, I believe it was very little. She shewed too that her thoughts had not been absent during our morning's work, by joining very earnestly in my narration of what had taken place, and giving a very decided opinion about Mrs Gower. Before we bade each other good-night, Lilian had succeeded in satisfying Mrs Tipper, as she had satisfied me, that she was 'not in love with another woman's husband.'
As days passed on my news remained still untold. Something seemed always to be intervening to cause me to put off the telling it until the morrow. Looking back, I see how very slight were some of the causes which I allowed to prevent me from opening my heart to my companions; although at the time they appeared sufficient.
Meantime we were occupied from morning till night, Lilian and I working together as with one mind. But we presently began to miss our master, as Lilian laughingly termed him, and I grew more than anxious as the days he had accustomed us to expect him passed without our seeing him. Not once had we heard from or seen him since that never-to-be-forgotten night. Did he really blame me? Could he not forgive me? I tormented myself with all sorts of doubts and fears, in my heart of hearts dreading something even worse than his blame or anger. Robert Wentworth was not the man either to judge harshly or to be unforgiving.
It was nearly a fortnight since we had seen him, when one evening Becky mysteriously beckoned me out of the room. Lilian was playing one of our favourite sonatas, and I made my escape unobserved.
'Another letter, Becky?' I asked, putting out my hand for it with a smile.
'No, Miss; it's a woman this time,' returned Becky. 'She says that she wants to see you alone, and she won't come in. I was to tell you she's waiting down at the end of the lane, and to be sure to say you are to go by yourself.'